Clark University - Clark News summer 2003
Alumni news and notes (summer 2003)
Dear Clark Alumni,
On behalf of the entire Alumni Association and its Executive Board, I want to thank all alumni for your efforts on behalf of Clark this year. Through your participation in the Alumni Association, your reunion committees, the Alumni Admissions Program, career programs and many other activities, you have energized your fellow alumni and made the Alumni Association a vibrant and necessary partner in Clark’s success. We had the opportunity to thank many of you in person at the Alumni Volunteer Reception that kicked off Reunion 2003—Alumni Weekend in May.
Reunion 2003 was truly a wonderful weekend, as you will see on pages 12-15 in this issue of Clarknews. One of the many highlights was the dedication of the Thomas ’62 and Joan ’60 Dolan Field House, which honored Tom and Joan and celebrated the opening of this stunning new facility.
Another highlight was the presentation of the Alumni Association awards. The Distinguished Service Award was presented to Steve Dune ’53, who celebrated his 50th Clark Reunion this year. The Distinguished Young Alumnus/a Award was presented to Boston City Councilor Michael Ross ’93, who celebrated his 10th Clark Reunion. See page 14 to learn more about these remarkable alumni.
This was an exciting year for Clark and the Alumni Association. The most dramatic change is in the Association’s governance. Returning to the executive-board model enhances our effectiveness and makes it easier for you to join a committee wherever you are in the world. Go to our alumni Web site and check out our “Volunteer Opportunities” link. E-mail us about your interests and strengths, and we’ll contact you with volunteer opportunities.
Technology use is also expanding. Our Alumni Online Community, a free service for Clark alumni, continues to grow dramatically and with great enthusiasm. Members can search for friends, share interests and experiences, submit online class notes and photos, gather and exchange information, locate one another and learn about upcoming campus and alumni-club events. For the first time in Clark Reunion history, we also ran two live reunion webcasts: one at Reunion Headquarters in the Higgins University Center and the second under the “Big Top” behind the President’s house.
On the regional front this year, we organized more than 45 alumni-and-friends events around the world. Events were held right here in Worcester and in places as far away as California, London and France. Many of these events were attended by President and Mrs. Bassett, along with more than 2,000 alumni and friends, Clark students, parents and even some students who are entering Clark this fall. The Alumni Association achieved many other goals this year, making important strides in technology, alumni admissions and career services. I encourage you to visit the alumni Web site on a regular basis to learn more about our progress.
I would be remiss if I did not, once again, thank the other Alumni Association executive officers: Faith Linsky ’76, first vice president; Richard Caswell ’89, executive vice president; and Larry Hershoff ’71, immediate past president. I would also like to thank Patti Love ’81, who served as an executive officer during our governance transition. Their dedication and commitment has laid the framework for our successful and innovative strategic plan. Following their example, so many other alumni have joined our efforts and are spreading the success stories that enhance Clark’s overall visibility, bring more students to the University and increase financial support for Clark.
To them and all of you who support Clark, I am grateful.
Dimitry Anselme ’93
Alumni Association President
Alumni Admissions News
As we begin to recruit the Class of 2008, I’d like to share with you some statistics from this past year’s cycle and explain how Alumni Admissions Program (AAP) volunteers helped attain those results.
AAP members continue to cover high-school, regional and national college fairs in their local areas. Clark was represented at 317 college fairs during the 2002-03 academic year, with alumni alone attending 107 of them. Many AAP members also provided Clark with additional information about the high schools in their areas. Alumni hosted 25 Clark on the Road: Information Sessions between September and November 2002 in homes, libraries, high schools and offices. Of the 125 students who attended these sessions, 60 were admitted, and 23 decided to enroll at Clark.
Alumni interviewers worked hard to complete interviews between November and March. We offered 1,123 interviews to Clark applicants. AAP members completed 824 assignments, almost 600 of them interviews. The remainder of the assignments were refused by the student, situations in which the student could not be reached, or had unknown results. These interviews were completed by 365 alumni. These numbers represent a slight increase over last year.
We also continued our “Captain Area” Interview Initiative this year. AAP captains in five designated areas work with a captain-area team of AAP members. The captain matches interview assignments with the team members, who conduct the interviews. Captain-area AAP members fulfilled 118 out of the 846 completed assignments this year.
I would like to share more detail with you about Clark’s successful admissions year. Dean of Admissions Harold Wingood shared the following statistics about the incoming class in an article in the AAP newsletter (please contact me for the full article). We received a record 3,944 applications and admitted 2,472 stduents, for an admit rate of 63 percent—the lowest at Clark in more than a decade. The application volume is a 6.6 percent increase over last year, and we are also close to our enrollment goal of 564. The quality of the admitted pool has also improved. The mean high-school grade point average increased from 3.4 in 2002 to 3.46. The average SAT verbal increased from 591 to 603, and the average math from 595 to 603, for a combined SAT average of 1206. The percentage of students ranked in the top 20 percent of their high-school class increased from 60 percent to 64 percent. According to Dean Wingood, “The Class of 2007 has the potential to be one of the strongest we have enrolled in years.”
Lastly, I am pleased to announce that AAP member Jen Kilbane ’97 (J_Kilbane@alumni.clarku.edu) was recently named national chair of the Alumni Admissions Committee. I encourage you to share your ideas with me (tuber@clarku.edu) or with Jen. In order to continue to recruit quality students who will find their niche at Clark, Jen and I need your help. We welcomed approximately 100 new AAP members this year, but there is plenty of room for more in this growing program.
Tricia Uber ’94
Program Coordinator
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