GAA Has Banner Year
Posted on Sept. 3, 1983From the University Report (published by the GAA 1970-94)
What words come to your mind when you hear the term “alumni association?” Reunion? Class notes? Homecoming? Carolina? Fund raising?
I’ve decided to share with you what might constitute an “annual report” for the UNC General Alumni Association for the past year.
Under the leadership of President Edward L. Rankin, Jr. ’40 of Concord, and continuing with his equally able successor, David L.Grigg ’61 of Albemarle, the Association reached the highest total membership in its history – 29,216 despite a 33 percent increase in annual dues and a 25 percent increase in the cost of a Life Membership which were effective July 1, 1982. In addition, 1,342 alumni joined the General Alumni Association as Life Members during the year, bringing that total to 11,850 as of June 20, 1983. (Despite this growth, still only 23 percent of our address-known alumni are Association members.)
The Association sponsored more than 160 activities during the year, involving more than 13,000 alumni and friends of the University. Included in this total were: 94 chapter meetings; 36 Association-sponsored trips to Carolina football and basketball games; 20 weekend, evening and summer seminars (many co-sponsored with The Program in the Humanities); 6 alumni tours (including two accompanied by UNC faculty members); a commencement program anchored by Roger Mudd MA ’51 called “The State of the University,” attended by 1,200 reunioning alumni.
The Association produced a new slide/sound show entitled “On the Road in Chapel Hill,” narrated by Charles Kuralt ’55 and designed for use at alumni chapter meetings.
Planning for Camp Blue Heaven was completed and this first-ever activity took place near Brevard, North Carolina in August.
Both Alumni Association publications – Carolina Alumni Review magazine and the University Report Newspaper underwent redesign.
The Association’s first long-range plan was developed and adopted.
Your Association, led by an active 50-member Board of Directors which sets policy for the Association and works closely with leaders in our 120 alumni chapters, is supported daily by yours 20-member staff here in Chapel Hill. While our resources are modest and our responsibilities great, our opportunities to serve both the University and our 150,000 alumni are exciting – and endless.
If there is any one frustration that we feel, it is over the continuing confusion many alumni experience in distinguishing between the General Alumni Association and Carolina Annual Giving. To put it succinctly, the General Alumni Association and Carolina Annual Giving are entirely separate.Carolina Annual Giving, part of the University’s Development Office, is the most visible fundraising agency at work expanding the much needed financial support to the University.
The General Alumni Association is an independent, non-profit organization which relies upon the generous support of our alumni through annual dues and tax deductible life membership gifts to support our programs and activities. Your gift to the University through Carolina Annual Giving does not bring with it membership in the General Alumni Association. Of course, we in the Alumni House hope that all of you will want to support both the University and the General Alumni Association. (A few alumni who join their professional schools’ alumni associations think that is the same as joining the General Alumni Association. Again, unfortunately, it is not.)
In my June column, I shared with you some personal reflections on my first year as Executive Secretary of the Association and confessed that while there were many very special experiences the most special one came on April 30 when Brian Charles Dibbert was born a “Tar Heel” at UNC’s Memorial Hospital.
I greet you this fall with the happy news that after many bottles and many more diapers, several burps and a few “short nights,” the Dibberts are anxious for the onslaught of alumni friends and family who will be returning with another football season to Chapel Hill.
I hope that all Carolina alumni – members of our Association and non-members alike – will stop by the Alumni House, conveniently located adjacent to the Carolina Inn, whenever any of you are in Chapel Hill, and need a map of the campus, advice on admissions, or just to see a friendly face. Of course, you may also want to check your alumni records and review your own personal file maintained here at the Alumni House.
Yes, the year has been a busy and rewarding one. I thank all of you for your personal support and your continuing interest and commitment to the Association and the University. Like Charles Kuralt ’55, I hope to see you “on the road,” if not here in Chapel Hill.
Yours at Carolina,
Douglas S. Dibbert ’70
