I planned my high school's 20-year reunion in Florida a couple of years ago. We also hired Reunited, Inc. to organize it. They do a good job of securing the reunion location and dinner, but it is entirely up to the reunion committee to search for and contact alumni; while this thankless task has been made easier by the Internet, it's still quite tedious. Reunited provided a basic list of alumni and kept us updated if their mailing address changed or was no good. I keep a relatively-up-to-date alumni database for my class; it took a lot of work to build it up, it's a lot easier to maintain it afterward!)
And just because you hire a reunion-planning company does not absolve you from keeping tabs on them to make sure they do what you ask them to do.
5-year reunions are rarely, if ever done, except for very small, close-knit high school classes. Most grads have either finished college, started law or medical school, or have just started their careers and family.
The 10-year reunion is usually the most popular and is well-known as the 'show-off' reunion. By this time, the law and medical students have finished their studies and begun their careers; most everyone else have either settled down, gotten married (and probably divorced) and had kids that mostly are out of diapers and beginning school.
15-year reunions are also 'oddballs', as you'll only probably see them with a very close-knit class, like the five-year.
20-year reunions are the first big milestone reunion - many are approaching middle-age and are settled well in careers and family. Beyond the 20-year reunion it's best to have a reunion every five years, as ten years between reunions may be a little too long. Some classes will do an informal reunion in odd-numbered years and more formal ones on milestone years. (20, 30, 40, etc.)
Don't be afraid to invite graduates from classes immediately junior or senior to you. It's not unusual for single-class reunions to have maybe up to 20-25% of your graduating class attend. Faculty members (current and former) should also be invited.
Those are good ideas you have there Senusret I. Unfortunately, not very many high schools have a very active alumni association. Shoot me a PM or e-mail and I'll be happy to share what research and information I have for planning a class reunion.
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ASF
Causa latet vis est notissima - the cause is hidden, the results are well known.
Alpha Alpha (University of Oklahoma) Chapter, #814, 1984
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