This is a really long newsletter. |
Pretty much all photos and writeups this week. The latest announcement (in your admin console) has quite a few recent release highlights in it too. Please do read on to see where we've been and what it looked like! |
Bruno says hi |
Recap: Brown Reunion |
Smooth sailing from start to finish with our friends from Maddock alumni house. The ever-impressive Campus Dance also had a little tweak this year too - with the right balance of staff and scanners, the university now has a better count of who attended than ever before. |
One common thread across our years of service with Brown stands out: the people. First, the student workers have found a way to make manning the check in stations FUN! The time simply flies by when they're there - and they're also eager helpers when it's time to move equipment, which is also deeply appreciated. And second, the news of Karen's imminent retirement added a bittersweet note to the weekend. She learned a lot about AlumnIQ, enthusiastically handled the build for reunion, asked many good questions (some of which led to product enhancements!), and is now preparing for her well-earned retirement. We will miss you, Karen! |
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Photos borrowed from Brown's gallery. Thanks, guys! |
For the Garnet |
Recap: Swarthmore Alumni Weekend |
Facebook has a way of reminding us of odd coincidences - like, for example, that I had last been on site for Swarthmore's reunion 6 years ago to the day. A whole (...we hope) pandemic happened in that time! |
This fun fact had zero impact on the sheer pleasantness of the experience. Emma held down the admin table with me while Rachelle organized a small army of student workers to run Gatekeeper (using iqKeys of course!) on their phones to scan people at various events. The best part? I really was only there for moral support. They had this whole routine down pat from beginning to end! |
And when I was leaving campus Saturday night all I could see were smiles - every alum on foot and golf cart was beaming with joy from the time they were having. This is why we do what we do. |
One footnote: as you'll see in the photos, their reunion booklet is my nominee for best of the season. I know it's the first thing to go when we're looking to cut costs but theirs was really well designed, comprehensive, and entirely worth it as a portable source of answers. Far superior to an app in almost every way. |
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In the City of New York |
Recap: Columbia Reunion |
Adam rolled from Princeton right on in to NYC so he'd be rested and ready to help Columbia execute a clean reunion. We're glad he was there to adapt as circumstances warranted. |
The Columbia team provided him with a new check in location, a wonderfully comprehensive guide to who needed scanning tech (and when!), and ample communications as they worked through the weekend together. |
Our congratulations to the alumni teams from Columbia College, SEAS, and General Studies for putting on a successful reunion at the tail end of a difficult spring semester. We know you had to put a lot of extra effort in to this and we wish you a well deserved and restful summer break. |
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(also) in the City of New York |
Recap: Columbia Business Reunion |
Meanwhile, up around 125th Street, Ken held down the fort with Columbia Business School. Teresa and Pam were the gracious hosts of a smooth, solid couple of days of reunion, connection, and networking. If you are up in that neighborhood, definitely check out the Manhattanville campus - it's really quite something! |
We have but one comment to draw on for this writeup, and I fear ruining it by writing much more: "this was the easiest and least stressful reunion so far." |
So I won't. |
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Adjacent to the City of New York |
Recap: Stevens Alumni Weekend |
New Jersey is the ancestral home of several AlumnIQ teammates; perhaps this is why we seem to easily mesh with the folks at Stevens. This year, Alyson was our first "look ma, no hands!" user of the new email features of the platform too (and repeat usage of the text messaging tool). So that was pretty cool. |
As you'll see in the photos, Alyson is also super organized - nobody's as diligent about labeling the scananas as she is and boy does it make the return and offloading process MUCH easier! |
Alan took advantage of an offsite printing adventure to live test a brand new printer(!) that is the ideal hybrid we've been looking for: compact like the Moon but with a cutter like the TSCs. I think we have a winner! |
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Alan was having so much fun he forgot to take more pictures. Oops. |
We Love Iowa |
Recap: Grinnell Reunion |
Christine hopped a plane to Iowa and spent three days with the Grinnellians. The seamless execution of the weekend is entirely attributable to the work of Beth Conover - she was largely responsible for the build, and boy did she relish the responsibility. Few clients start as early as she did and the results practially speak for themselves: every situation had been anticipated, discussed, planned, and executed to a T. |
An example: their faculty are invited to participate in a dinner event, and much like students they won't preregister (you know it's true!). Dining services appreciates knowing where the numbers are even as the event gets underway. Understanding that even express reg was too much overhead for this segment, we devised a magic QR code to scan that recorded a simple headcount for walk in faculty that allowed them to breeze in and also give our partners the intel they needed. Beth anticipated this MONTHS ahead of time and it directly resulted in an improved experience for all. |
We're always listening, always learning, and love finding partners like this to pair up with. |
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Honorable Mention |
University of Delaware Alumni Weekend |
2013 was the first time we connected printing services to our registration platform in order to help UD manage alumni weekend's exploding registration numbers. Look at where we are today because of that! |
While we weren't on campus with them this year, we did remotely support the above and beyond efforts of Alison to execute a radically restructured, streamlined, and still successful alumni weekend. She squeezed every bit of self-service functionality out of the system up to but just shy of using any on site equipment - like the old days! |
When budgetary conditions improve we will be excited to come back for NDB, the requisite DFH, a cameo from YoUDee (and baby blue!), and a cooler full of UD Creamery goodies to take home. And of course, a full weekend with the people we've come to know and appreciate working (and laughing) alongside for over a decade now. |
Saving it for next week |
St. Olaf Commencement & Reunion |
We'll write this one up after we consult with Kate, who did EVERYTHING on her own this year too. The Oles had a unique name tag layout that deserves a proper writeup - and this newsletter is already plenty long enough. |
