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News Washington News Welcome to the March, 2002 edition of Washington News, the Washington Services newsletter. Washington News is published each second month and is designed to alert clients and others to developments in international school and university administration. Read on for client consulting activity, development and marketing news items and a featured article on alumni relations. Washington Services works with schools and universities internationally assisting them with alumni relations, fundraising, marketing, feasibility studies and governance opportunities. In this edition
Recent Consulting Activity (return to top) In recent months Washington Services has been engaged by a range of local and international clients, some of the more rewarding assignments being: Australian International School Hong Kong - Conduct of a review of the governance procedures and practices of the school Board. Consultants Philip Roff and Frank Opray provided this 600 student K-12 school with an audit of its governance processes making a range of recommendations as to possible enhancements. Established in 1995 and only from September 2001 finally residing in its permanent home in a spectacular new campus in Kowloon Tong, AISHK offers the New South Wales Higher School Certificate and has quickly established itself as an icon of Australian education throughout the region. United World College of South East Asia, Singapore - Review of the prospects for a Development function at UWCSEA. The UWC Movement across its 10 member schools has a well deserved reputation for the promotion of international understanding through education and of making education relevant to the global needs of our time. Consultant Frank Opray assisted the College in assessing how the establishment of a Development function could bring philanthropic support to a much expanded scholarship programme. St Andrew's College, Adelaide - Assistance with the establishment and implementation of a Development function. Founded in 1850 St Andrew's is the pre-eminent independent primary (R-7) school in South Australia. It offers the primary years International Baccalaureate and is the first stand-alone primary school in Australia to have its curriculum internationally recognised. Consultant Frank Opray has assisted St Andrews with a review of the prospects for a Development function, with the recruitment of a Director of Development and with her professional orientation. Development and Marketing News Items (return to top) Web Search Engine Optimisation Recognising the increasing importance of web sites for international schools, webmasters can submit their web site to up to 1500 directories or search engines which populate the net, most of which offer free registration. However, simply submitting to search engines does not guarantee visitors. If people cannot find your site in the first 10 to 20 matches of a search, then the submission is a waste of time. Search Engine Optimisation is a new technique whereby a particular site is positioned advantageously on a limited number of the best used search engines such that that the site comes up preferentially when key search words relevant to its offering are submitted. Such words or phrases might include: “international schools Singapore”, “private schools Hong Kong”, “boarding schools China” or “independent schools Sydney”. The specialists who provide this service research the most oft used phrases relevant to the industry in question and match these individually to the search criteria of each of the 12 or 15 most commonly used search engines. The net result of this would be that a school that did not rate at all under say “independent schools Sydney” would achieve a top three rating in the search engines optimised. The likely impact on site visits is apparent. Remembering that some 80% of web users start each of their internet sessions at a major search engine the validity of this technique is clear. Additionally the majority of web users will select a response from the first page of a search result. It is thus imperative to be in that first page and near the top of it. Simply put, submission will get you a spot in a search engine; optimisation will get you a top spot! Washington Services can provide introductions to experienced search optimisation specialists. Tax Deductibility - UK based donors International schools for some time have enjoyed tax deductibility for supporters subject to US taxation and a similar arrangement is now available for UK taxpayers who may wish to support international schools or universities with tax effective donations. In the UK, as in the US, tax deductibility is a key component of an individual's giving motivation and its availability will much enhance a school's alumni outreach programme and its fundraising efforts. Full details on this new initiative are available from Washington Services. Featured Article - Alumni Relations, Meeting the New Challenges (return to top) This is an abridged version of an article by Frank Opray which appeared in the July 2001 edition of Creative School Management. It explores the changing needs and aspirations of alumni and reviews evolving practices and techniques for the pro active Development office to accommodate these. In today’s world it can no longer be assumed that alumni will automatically maintain interest in the continuing fortunes of their alma mater, nor even make an attempt to remain contactable. A number of societal factors appear to be driving this trend, they include: · time pressures on alumni, especially on the employment front, · the increasing mobility of recent graduates, · the pressure to belong to a range of other affinity or interest groups, including emerging employer “alumni” groups, · a desire for people to receive communication on “their terms” rather than in a form which best suits the institution, · the consequential “me factor” which sees young graduates focussing on their own careers and interests to a greater extent than earlier generations did. Each of these factors represents a challenge for those charged with the responsibility of maintaining good and improving alumni relations. Collectively they present an atmosphere of intimidation which suggests that Alumni Officers need to carefully re-examine the programmes they offer and the practices and techniques they apply in support of them. Institutional Responses - Practices, Techniques & Tools In response to this dynamic scene schools are introducing new programmes and processes of communication for their alumni and, in some cases, shedding old ones. Many of the changes occurring rely on new technologies which are becoming available – mostly drawn directly from the business world. As ever with developments in school fundraising and alumni relations many of these changes are first evident in North America and much of what follows draws on experience from there. Some of the most prominent changes and developments are: School are instituting programmes of offering departing students an “email for life” in the name of the past students’ association and encouraging the alumni to use this or link it to their regular email address. This reflects the fact that email is becoming a more universal means of communication and in such circumstances it matters little that the physical address is lost as contact can be maintained via email. Specialist firms have appeared offering outsourced provision and maintenance of the “email for life” products often in conjunction with other alumni services as we will see later. Alumni associations are finding it is cheaper, more direct and more effective to communicate and issue invitations by email wherever possible, the challenge being to interrogate alumni for their email addresses at every opportunity and to manage selective broadcasting of emails with the assistance of suitable software. Given the very low, almost non-existent, cost of email it is feasible for schools to broadcast a number of reminders or “teasers” for functions and this is becoming more common. Short Messaging Service Just as we are becoming accustomed to email as the preferred from of communication to alumni, along comes another development, this time in the form of Short Messaging Service, (SMS), or “text messaging” to mobile phones. Dedicated service providers are offering the facility of selective broadcast short messages to mobile phones which lends itself ideally to reminders for alumni functions and the like, particularly for younger alumni who are enthusiastically embracing this new technology. Whilst the unit cost of SMS is dearer than email, it is significantly cheaper than mailed communication costs of close to $1 allowing for material, postage and time Web Portals Continuing the theme of playing to the needs and aspirations of younger alumni schools are beginning to customise their web site using portals such as Yahoo, MSN or Excite as vehicles. In other words a school or alumni site when accessed will open with a customised version of a Yahoo or similar inclusive of the usual news, sports and stock exchange reports with alumni news superimposed on this. The objective is therefore to encourage all alumni to use this as their “home page”. Custom Communities Alumni Custom Community services provide schools with a web-based solution for member management, dues and donations management, event/reunion management and community management. Such user-friendly technologies include tools that allow schools to stay connected with their alumni and allow those alumni to stay connected with one another. The key objective is to reduce the cost of maintenance of the alumni body allowing alumni officers to get on with building alumni relations rather than being bogged down updating files. Examples of Customer Community service provider sites in the USA can be found at http://www.planetalumni.com/ and http://www.iaccorp.com/. Online Event Management Event management is one of the most time consuming aspects of the work of an alumni office and there are now available online registration, eMarketing, and data analysis applications for alumni professionals. These sites can launch targeted email campaigns for specific events while saving time, money, and effort in the alumni office. Their services include: · online Registration · secure online fee collection · targeted email campaigns · automated reminders · pre- and post-event surveys · customized online invitations · instant reporting and data analysis. A good example of an online event management service company can be found at http://www.cvent.com/ (sic). Business Contacts It is acknowledged that the informal network has operated in schools for decades but with the technology the web and email now offer the opportunity has emerged to formalise these networks. To see how this has been automated relative to contacts in Asia, using the web as the vehicle, visit the Melbourne Old Wesley Collegians’ web site at http://www.owca.net/ and access the “Asian Alliance Programme” page. This programme was part funded by the Victorian Government’s Alumni Programme. In summary, school alumni offices need to respond to the challenge that their alumni are likely to be harder to engage and those offices therefore need to be more innovative in servicing them as a consequence. Fortuitously the alumni office has technology as a strong ally in this outreach process.
Further Information (return to top) For further information and all other enquiries regarding Washington Services' consultancy services, please contact Frank Opray at: frank@opray.net Washington Services [ About Us | Our Products | Sporting Clubs |Email Form | Related Sites ] Copyright © 1998-2007 Washington Services. All Rights Reserved. |
