After graduating, as you are starting your professional life and taking on new challenges in your new career, staying connected with your university and your fellow grads through the Alumni Association has its perks. Indeed, keeping your contact information up-to-date, especially to change your address, allows you to take advantage of exclusive offers and benefits offered to new and old graduates! The university’s alumni association offers benefits to the school, in addition to helping you keep in touch with a network of graduates in different fields of studies. Here is a list of reasons why it is important to update your address with the Alumni Association or the Graduates Network of your university.
Be informed of news related to your university and of upcoming events
Keeping your contact information up-to-date allows you to receive relevant news concerning your old university through their newsletter or email list, as well as staying connected to the grads community or the latest developments in your field of studies. It also keeps you informed of upcoming events or job opportunities that may interest you. You will thus be able to stay in the loop when it comes to global networking events, alumni get-togethers, job postings and other activities you wouldn’t want to miss out on. By staying informed, you implicitly participate to the good standing of your University!
Share your professional expertise with new graduates
Your university certainly wants to see its graduates succeed in their professional path. This often means that they will contact former students who are already well established in their career to help mentor students or recent graduates as they are starting their professional life. Career fairs, students networking events and alumni-to-student mentoring opportunities are all examples of activities that your University may need your help with. Thus, keeping your information up-to-date is a good way for you to give back to the student community, by sharing your professional expertise and even your personal experience with students who are starting out in their professional life just like you were!
Support your university and the next generation of students
It’s no secrets, universities often rely on donations to help students carry out their projects or to maintain their facilities. Thus, they regularly solicit the support of alumni. Graduates can make occasional or planned donations, or join a young donor club, to help future generations of students and help the school with its long-term development as well. You may also want to develop your philanthropic side by investing more of your time: joining a committee, becoming an international delegate or collaborator, being on the school board… Regardless of the type of investments you wish to make, keeping your contact information updated makes it easier for you to be aware of the different ways you can contribute to your university.
Help your university keep their records up-to-date
In order to stay in touch with their alumni and keep them up to date with the latest developments or news, it is important for the university to maintain an accurate database. This allows the institution to keep statistics on former students in the workforce, which provides useful information to current students and to the alumni community, such as employment or location of alumni. Thus, a large number of universities hold lists of the best employers to hire their graduates!
We hope that this article was helpful and provided you with the reasons why it’s important to stay connected with the graduate network at your university, and thus why it’s important to notify your former school of your change of address after you move.
Be proud of your Uni colors, stay in touch!
