Our Vision
The Office of Alumni Engagement partners with the Binghamton University Alumni Association
to generate pride among our alumni and students, and to inspire them to be engaged
with the University and each other.
The following six focal points will guide our activity through 2025. Each of our programs will be designed to demonstrate the value of the Alumni Association, help meet your needs for career-focused and educational content, assist you in expanding your personal and professional networks, or provide you with occasions to show your pride in the University.
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Professional and social engagement opportunities
Affinity Group Engagement: Because students and alumni create bonds through their involvement in smaller affinity groups — many of which organically evolved from student organizations — we will increase our efforts to nurture and cultivate the activity of these groups.
Alumni Association Awards: In the future, we will present the signature awards (Bartle, Alumni Achievement, Weisband and DeFleur) and Medals of Distinguished Service at two separate events, rather than at one combined event. We have also introduced the Bearcats of the Last Decade 10 Under 10 awards, which would be presented at an event of their own. By making these changes, we'll have more opportunities to celebrate the recipients and promote the University's reputation through broadcast and social media coverage.
Alumni Global Days of Service: Instead of holding this event on a single designated weekend, the Alumni Association will promote alumni volunteerism throughout the year to more fully demonstrate the impact of everyone's community service.
Homecoming: Efforts will continue to make Homecoming a premier signature event for Binghamton University. Event planning will focus on growing attendance by offering programs with mass appeal to our alumni base.
Regional alumni outreach: Geographic areas will be prioritized based on the number of alumni living there, the amount of volunteer interest and the value of the region to the University's and Alumni Association's objectives.
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Mentoring opportunities for students
The Alumni Association offers Mentor Match, an online platform connecting Binghamton students with alumni — helping to prepare them for a successful future, navigate their careers and, perhaps, explore new career paths. Open to all students and alumni from all class years, programs and schools, Mentor Match gives mentees exclusive access to a robust network of alumni mentors who are eager to share their wisdom and advice about professional life after graduation. Mentors can connect with mentees anywhere — from just down the street or around the globe.
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Career development for students and alumni
CONNECT: This is the University's premier program intended to bring students and alumni together for employer visits and regional networking events. It is primarily designed around the Fleishman Center’s efforts to connect students with alumni in our key markets for graduates. The program has events annually in the following locations based on our strongest graduate hiring markets: New York, Boston, Washington and San Francisco.
Alumni Career Connections: We work to identify alumni employees in companies of interest to students and bring selected alumni back to campus (virtually or in person) to speak with students about their time at Binghamton, their career journey and answer questions posed by students. Currently, we schedule six presentations each semester.
CareerShift: This virtual resource available to our alumni and students helps expand our ability to support alumni because the University’s career services are fully maximized with supporting students. It is a job posting aggregator, company directory and job search management system all in one.
Spring Networking Event: This initiative is designed to bring alumni and students together to teach students the soft skills necessary to build relationships.
School- and Program-Based Networking Opportunities: These provide alumni and students with face-to-face interactions in career sectors that cannot be met through the programs listed above.
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Admissions efforts to recruit the best of future alumni
Demographics in the Northeast region show a declining number of college-age students in the coming decade. To compete for the best students to maintain the University’s level of excellence and sustain program growth, alumni volunteers will need to play a more active role to help support the admissions process in the years ahead.
Our goal would be to engage alumni who are willing and capable of assisting the Office of Undergraduate Admissions in enthusiastically encouraging the best students to attend Binghamton University. Working with Admissions, we would identify key regions and school districts to develop strategies for either increasing applications or enhancing yield.
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Virtual education opportunities
Book Club: Responding to changes in our national environment, we launched this program in May 2020 with nearly 1,200 members, more than half of whom had never been engaged in other alumni programs.
Binghamton Learning Network: This is a webinar series designed to provide a monthly 20-minute presentation with a Q&A on topics of interest such as career counseling, financial planning and current events. Speakers would be alumni and occasionally faculty. We anticipate developing topics and participants in the fall of 2020 and launching in spring 2021.
Virtual Reunions: These would be a cost-effective way to engage alumni celebrating milestones (e.g., class-year reunions and affinity reunions).
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Lifelong Learning
Alumni Travel Programs: We would partner with faculty and staff to offer alumni a travel experience that combines leisure with education.
Lyceum: The Alumni Association will promote Lyceum to alumni across the country. Lyceum is a lifelong learning program offered by the University to people living in the immediate Binghamton area. Programs have typically been held in person and intended for people 50 years of age and above. By pivoting to an online delivery model, Lyceum courses and workshops will have a wider reach.
Science Cabarets: These had been offered in the Binghamton area to showcase faculty research through casual meet-and-greet events. The Alumni Association will revisit this program with the goal of creating a virtual version to possibly launch in 2023.
