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Originally posted by dardenr
Well, the alumni pages won't load right now.
The thing about Alpha Phi Omega is that our national alumni structure could be much stronger. The difference between us, and say Phi Beta Sigma, is that they have an extremely active alumni network. Their alumni/graduate chapters are encouraged to have their own programs of service and fellowship. They also pay chapter and national dues. Their life membership (though expensive) does offer the benefit of NEVER having to pay national dues again.
APO is nowhere near that structure. APO is over 75 years old. Our alumni network should be as strong as any other civic organization, such as the Kiwanis or Jaycees.
In order for people to see the benefit of becoming a life member and making the relatively small financial contribution to APO, we need to be presenting them with an active and extensive alumni network. There's no reason that their can't be an active alumni association in every major urban area in the United States. If people actually SEE that the committment doesn't stop at graduation, that could encourage them to become life members.
And I'm not going to put the blame on the students. If all the alumni involvement they saw as undergrads was in the form of section staff and advisors, I might not be active, either. We shouldn't expect each of our recent alums to jump into staff with both feet. Hell, I've been on staff, and it ain't fun.
And YES, I plan on doing something about all of that.
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I have to agree with your accessment of APO's so-called "National Alumni Association". I don't have much experience with Alumni Associations other then my universities. Ours needs to be more organized then it currently is, and work on getting more local area alumni associations setup in major metro areas, as you said. This is one of the reasons I've been working with other area alumni to setup such a group in the South Florida area.
Check out the proposed legislation for this National Convention. There seems to be some good ones to fix some of the problems with the NAA.