Project Outline for University of Colorado Alumni Association

Project Purpose:

Expand the Alumni Association’s footprint on the campus with students, faculty and staff. We have developed an action/marketing plan, but would find it invaluable to have a student group critique it for the purpose of improving the plan as well as to develop and implement at least one marketing strategy. We are looking to develop traditions as much as we are a sequence of strategies that will build awareness with the students. This is an incredible opportunity to have students help us enhance the student to alumni experience!

History

The Alumni Association reinvented itself in the fall of 2008. After a long transition between the Foundation and the University, the Alumni Association found new roots and became a department of Student Affairs as well as adopted a new business model called Forever Buffs.

We dissolved our membership dues program and Forever Buffs was developed. It was clear that the alumni pathway begins the moment a student steps foot on campus and there is no reason students should wait until they graduate to benefit from the Alumni Association. This is a new way of organizing alumni business and it has incredible potential.

In 2009, the UCSU Legislative Council recognized this great opportunity and supported it by passing a resolution in favor of a new student matriculation fee that helps to underwrite the program costs.

We have identified the programs and services thathave value for students, and have begun to promote them.We are also promoting the message that students are part of something bigger than the immediate campus. Students are part of a family with over 240,000 alumni and 30,000 students. Through the themes of engage, contribute and celebrate, the members of the Forever Buffs family can make a difference to each other.

Project Objectives

  • Provide guidance for improving the action/marketing plan for the campus outreach related to Forever Buffs.
  • Implementation of a single (or several) marketing strategy that the students either adopt from the plan or develop themselves.
  • Ideally, the above marketing idea would be something that could develop into a campus tradition related to Forever Buffs.

Project Scope

The scope of this is new territory and is only limited by the collective imagination of students and alumni.

Deliverables

  • Improve upon the current action and marketing plans
  • Implement at least one marketing strategy

Project Approach

Initially, we will have a conversation about what Forever Buffs is and share our current action plans for both alumni and students. We will also introduce the staff management team to the students. Subsequently, we will talk about the student action plan and build upon it. Having a solid plan, we will then select at least one marketing strategy for implementation. The specific strategy would then determine our timeline. Working with the student team for a semester or an entire academic year will also determine our implementation timeline.

Critical Milestones and Event Dates

September 16th and 17th is our Alumni Board of Directors meeting. We will plan to introduce the student team and provide a project update to the Student and Alumni Engagement Committee.

Roles & Responsibilities

  • The student team members are to act as advisors for the action plan and to become an implementation team for at least one of the marketing strategies.
  • The company representative will make herself available for discussions and brainstorming as well as management of the marketing strategy.

Quality Considerations

These are working documents that are reviewed by the Director of Student and Alumni Engagement, the Alumni Association Executive Director as well as our alumni board members. The marketing strategy will hopefully become a campus tradition that will continue to affect future students for years to come! We expect a top notch idea to result from this student team.

Assumptions

  • The company representative is available on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.
  • Because this is a current work in progress we will not hold up our existing plans, but we will update and add the student team’s recommendations along the way.

University of Colorado – LeedsSchool of Business

Project Outline Document

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