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20 Friends for Life
20 Friends for life
Alumni-work has a long tradition in the
Anglo-Saxon educational world; in
Germany the concept is still in its infancy.
On the one hand the facts – as far as
Reutlingen University is concerned - are
sobering, because in the past it was not
seen as necessary to organise Alumni
affairs at Reutlingen on a centralised
basis. As a result a number of separate,
decentralised Alumni organisations have
grown up, reaching various stages of
development in various Schools, but not
coordinated with each other in any way.
The Alumni concerned identify primarily
with their former School, in some cases
even with their particular programme of
studies, rather than with the institution
as a whole.
On the other hand, we are becoming
increasingly aware that solid Alumniwork
is a key element of “Friend-raising,
brain-raising and fund-raising”. In the
future we are going to be in urgent need
firstly of the emotional and later of the
financial support of our graduates, if we
wish to continue to occupy a top position
in a global education market at a time
when state funding is falling. Whilst strong
decentralised School-based Alumni
organisations form the foundation, the
aim of a comprehensive campus-wide
Alumni Association must be to create
synergies in order to increase the
attractiveness and the scope of the
decentralised organisations.
The medium- to long-term vision for
an Alumni Association for Reutlingen
University is based on the following
premises:
- There is a need for a central Alumni
Association which will be perceived as a
quantitative and qualitative enhancement
of the decentralised organisations.
- To this end a central Alumni Office will
be established which will function as a
sort of holding company. All members of
the decentralised Alumni organisations
will automatically also become members
of the central “holding company”. This
Office will be run by Alumni-members on
a voluntary basis.
- Professional Alumni-software will be
made available campus-wide. This will
include an integrated client-system which
will make it possible to work at the level
of the individual School, but will bundle
together the complex management and
processing of all data. At the same time
this software will be linked to the
university’s central databases to ensure
that Alumni data can be transferred and
updated as economically as possible
whilst maintaining the highest standards
of data-protection.
- The activities of the central Alumni
Association will expand the portfolios of
the decentralised organisations and make
them easier to administer, but will by no
means replace them.
- In order to ensure technical and
administrative continuity, a person will
be employed to function as an interface
between the “holding company”, the
University and the decentralised Alumni
organisations, whilst at the same time
providing central Alumni services.
From left to right: Three of the prime movers in the game called “Friend-raising, brain-raising and then sometime
also fund-raising”: Andreas Kurtz, President of “Campus Reutlingen e.V”); Professor Stephan Höfer; and
Kristof Trenka, one of the experienced “old” and “new” driving forces in Alumni matters at Reutlingen University,
- all taking a creative break on the campus.
Important groundwork towards the
realisation of these ideas has been
carried out during the winter-semester
2006-2007:
- In 2006-2007 a series of four-day
seminars has been organised, and
bilingual publications and websites have
been produced, all funded by a special
grant from the German Academic
Exchange Service for international Alumni
projects.
- “Campus Reutlingen e.V” is making
funds available for the initial financing
of the administrative post, setting up a
registered society, legal advice and the
provision of the aforementioned
professional software.
- Above and beyond this, the Chairman
of “Campus”, Mr. Andreas Kurtz, is
providing sustained support and personal
commitment as we put these ideas into
practice.
- An extremely committed group of
students working under the guidance of
Prof. Dr. Dietmar Bönke from the School
of Informatics, in cooperation with all
Schools, carried out a market research
project to determine the most suitable
software for our needs. On the basis of
this recommendation an all-in-one
database package for dealing with
centralised and decentralised tasks is to
be purchased.
Moreover, we have been able to engage
Mr. Christof Trenka, a former member of
the Senate and a graduate of the
University, to take the lead in the
founding of the central Alumni
association. As a graduate of two Schools,
Applied Chemistry (Diplom) and European
School of Business (MBA) he fulfils all
the requirements for playing a committed
and competent role in the development
of campus-wide Alumni services. (sth)