The Great Raft Debate
Posted on Feb. 5, 1990From the University Report (published by the GAA 1970-94)
Not too long ago, I spoke at a professional conference as part of “The Great Raft Debate.” A chief development officer, a chief public information officer, and I were asked to assume that we had been cast at sea and only one of us could survive. To make the discussion more lively, we were to assume that a new university president facing severe budget problems had to eliminate all but one of our three departments. We were to explain why our unit should survive.
Unfortunately, such a debate implies that alumni directors, development officers and public information officers do not recognize our interdependence. It further suggests that the abolishment of an alumni association by a university chief executive officer would be possible. As our readers know, UNC’s alumni association is independent of the University and could not be dissolved by the University.
The debate was great fun, but ended up mostly as a discussion about the competing importance of alumni relation compared to fund raising, leaving the public information officer as an interested observer. Let me share with you just some of my argument for choosing the alumni office to survive.
Alumni affairs the oldest unit of institutional advancement. For decades, the alumni office performed all of the public affairs and the fundraising function. At Carolina, the General Alumni Association formed Alumni Annual Giving in 1952, and then Alumni Secretary J. Maryon “Spike” Saunders ’25 also served as AAG’s acting director until Tom Bost ’35 assumed that position. On most campuses, the alumni office has the greatest identity, visibility and credibility among the alumni.
The choice as presented can reflect the attitude that the institution has toward its alumni. The greatest contribution, financial and otherwise, come when alumni are well-informed and fully involved in the vital area of their university. Reducing alumni involvement only to that of contributor, fund raisers, or athletic boosters would demean this relationship and shortchange both the institution and the alumni. Alumni can and should do more than write checks and attend athletic events.
Alumni can lobby legislators, recruit student, represent the institution to the public and, of particular importance, serve as loving critic of their university. Alumni can give advice, assess the curriculum and help select senior administrators. Alumni relations should be an end unto itself and not a means to an end. For those who believe that fundraising officers are more important, remember the most important element of fundraising — donor identification, donor cultivation and donor solicitation — all are performed usually by alumni.
Our Association provides the means for alumni involvement and provide very necessary services to the University. Alumni records, which GAA maintains, are essential for any form of ongoing communication. Carolina clubs bring alumni and friends together to learn more about our University and to participate in project s of benefit to our University. Weekend seminars, vacation college , homecoming, class reunion , the student alumni association, alumni travel, alumni awards — all are important opportunities for alumni to become informed and involved. The alumni magazine and this newspaper bring new about University challenges and achievements, Association news and personal news about Carolina alumni.
As the “raft debate” concluded, I observed that at most institutions the alumni officer is the only senior institutional advancement officer who is an alumnus of the institution. In many cases, the chief development officer’s first commitment is to their profession and, as a result, they tend to move from campus to campus. Thus, it falls to the alumni office also to preserve institutional traditions.
The high profile given to development at many public colleges and universities is because increasingly, chief executive officers have come to believe that their own performance will in part be judged by how effective they are at fund raising. And because many such CEO’s have little training in fund raising, they have understandably turned to the development professional to shoulder much of this burden.
As I have often noted, alumni commitment to the University is lifelong. Faculty and staff come and go, but alumni realize the value of our degree is measured not in the reputation of the university when the degree was received but in the institution’s present standing.
And so alumni not only have an emotional attachment to our alma mater but we also have a professional inters t in seeing that the University’s excellence is maintained and enhanced.
Whenever we come home to Chapel Hill to refresh our understanding of the University and to renew friendship , let us come not as visitors cast at sea but as equal partners in the important work of our University.
Yours at Carolina,
Douglas S. Dibbert ’70
