Alumni Engagement
Partnering with Alumni Relations Resource Guide
Support for Faculty & Staff with Alumni Engagement
Westfield State is made stronger when we engage our graduates; people who have experienced our high-quality, student-centered, and career-focused education. Our alumni go on to accomplish great achievements in their fields, and stay committed to their alma mater in many ways. They provide opportunities for student interns and employment, fund scholarships, and help recruit the next generation of Owls to the Nest.
The Alumni Relations team is ready to support academic departments, student support programs, and student organizations as they seek to network and engage with our vast community of Westfield State Alumni. The Office of Alumni Relations has adopted the recent CASE Alumni Engagement Metric areas of: Communication, Volunteer, Experiential, and Philanthropic engagement opportunities.
Our office seeks new and meaningful ways to engage alumni constantly. Please feel free to email the office and schedule a meeting to discuss ideas you have.
Alumni Outreach
The Division of Institutional Advancement, consisting of Advancement Services, Alumni Relations, Annual Giving, and Advancement is responsible for managing alumni communication and data (including contact information and communication preferences) using a constituent relationship management (CRM) tool. Many of our alumni have affinity and relationships with various areas of the university, and it is important for us to carefully coordinate communication with them to ensure they receive information that is relevant to their experiences, and reflects their up-to-date contact information and preferences.
Most commonly, email is the preferred method of communication with our alumni, and our office is able to coordinate communications with our internal partners, depending on the purpose of the request. This enables us to utilize our CRM, and communicate with our external constituents based on their preferences, and update information as it becomes available or is submitted to us.
All requests for alumni communication must be associated with a legitimate university business purpose and advance an institutional priority. While some requests for stand-alone alumni communication may not be approved, alumni relations staff will work with the requester to identify and or leverage other communication channels where appropriate. This may include your content placed in the monthly alumni e-newsletter, promotion on Alumni Social Media, or promotion on the westfieldalumni.org website.
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Communication Request
Please email alumni@westfield.ma.edu with your communication request. We advise reaching out at least 4-6 weeks in advance of your requested communication. When making your request, please provide:
- Department, office, or organization requesting the communication
- Purpose of communication (example: department update or alumni survey, event invitation)
- Population of alumni you hope to engage (example: All alumni with an undergraduate degree in Elementary Education)
- Proposed date of communication
Once received, we will reach out to you to confirm your needs and work through approval. Once approved, the communication will be scheduled in our departmental calendar. We will then work with you on email/ communication drafts, and ensure branding consistency.
Data & Reports
When partnering with Alumni Relations, and using the email communication tool, we are able to track bounce backs, updated alumni data, and communication preferences.
We are also able to provide information on open rates, click throughs, and other relevant information that can help us to refine our communication to individual alumni based on their interests and needs.
Please feel free to request a post-communication report for your project.
Ways We Engage
