Open Letter to Alumni Magazines
Dear Alumni Magazines,
What are you even trying to accomplish?
I am a recent grad and, like most in my position, I am having a hard time finding a job. I desperately want to work in my field, but I can’t seem to catch a break. All the time and money I spent at your school still didn’t give me all the “experience” that many employers are asking for. Now, I’m stuck. Hoping and praying for someone to take a chance on me so I can finally be doing what I paid so dearly to be qualified to do.
This is where a good, helpful, alumni magazine comes in. I hope you are taking notes.
Instead of real resources for grads, you fill your pages with glossy and posed “candid” photos and claptrap of self congratulations about how your school turns out leaders.
Sure, don’t get me wrong, that’s interesting enough but what good does it do? Perhaps this would be better served as a method of recruiting prospective students. I would have been wowed when picking my future school by the fact that an alumni now holds the position of the head of a major corporation, or that a whole family has attended the school, but now that I’ve graduated, I couldn’t care less.
Instead of something helpful and resourceful that I could actually use, the most recent alumni magazine plopped in my mailbox like a big, sweaty frog. Page after page of cheesy photos accompanied by the kind of drivel only your grandmother would care to read. It was self serving and devoid of reason.
The worst part? It made me feel like a tiny little failure. It taunted me, reminded me of all the hopes and dreams that have recently been trashed to no end in my search for a job. Every time I looked at it, it made me feel inadequate and broken because I couldn’t even picture myself accomplishing anything close to what they have, even if I had years of experience.
The most important part of an alumni magazine, in my opinion, would be to provide continuing support to former students. I would be happy with information about programs at the school that could enhance my degree, and other information that could actually have some bearing on my life. This is not what I was given.
At no time was there any information about jobs for recent graduates. Are you telling me that Mrs. Perfect who just became head of a major corporation here in Canada doesn’t have any connections on positions for us newbies in her field? Would it kill anyone working at these “magazines” to ask these successful people for the contact email of their hiring coordinator that could be added in a footnote after the puff piece? Even if these connections come to nothing, even if the emails never even get read by the companies who offer to read them, it still gives us hope.
For every story about a successful graduate in charge, or in a position of importance at a company, there was a small two lines at the bottom that reads something like “_____ would like to encourage all graduates of ______ school to email our human resources department at ______. We have positions opening all the time and might just have a place for you!” I could happily tolerate all the fluffy crap that comes with it.
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Like I said, even if the hiring director deleted all the emails immediately upon receiving them, or if they replied with a “sorry, no open positions right now” I would be happy.
It gives us a sense that the school actually cares. It says “Hey, thanks for racking up those enormous student loans that you will be paying off for the next 20 years. We appreciate your choosing us, and we really do want you to succeed. Here’s a little something extra for sticking with us till the end. We got you”
What “extras” did the latest school offer me? Better rates on home and car insurance. Big deal. I don’t even have car. Can’t afford one yet. I’m stuck in terrible service jobs that pay next to nothing for harder work than the job my degree was supposed afford me.
These stories didn’t motivate me, they didn’t inspire me, and they offered no information in relation to getting myself on the same type of career track. They were pretty words about special people shoved in my face, reminding me that I wasn’t one of them.
Give us real hope. Give us tangible things we can grab onto, something that tells us that our career choices, that all the hard work, the sleepless nights, the exams, the debt on our shoulders, that all of that was worth it. Don’t just tell me Sally and Matt are raking in six figures.
TELL ME HOW TO GET THERE TOO.
I’ve gotten the phone calls too, from the alumni office. The ones where they asked you how you liked the school, what you took, what you are doing now. I flat out told the girl once I was having a hard time finding a job in my field. I all got in return was a sympathetic noise and then she asked me for donations to support the school.
I know I might be bitter right now, because I’m having such a hard time. It won’t always be the case. I do know that if I feel this way, then no doubt there are many, many more people out there who have, and will feel the same soul crushing sadness that comes from flipping through one of these magazines.
Check yourself, please. Sit down and think about what happened to the other 80% of your school’s alumni who didn’t take over the world. Think about what you can do for them. A little more humanity, possibly?
You have your orders, ladies and gentleman.
Proceed accordingly.
This piece was written 4 years ago when I was just starting out in my career. Do these magazines still exist? I hope not! I haven’t seen one since.
I hesitated publishing it back then but when I found this in my drafts after all this time, it still resonates with me. I have a feeling it might resonate with you, too.
