future alumni
Building alumni and student connections
Helping alumni connect with students is how the UW Alumni Association strengthens the Husky experience — from day one to graduation and beyond.
Cuisine and conversation. For many students, dorm food or cheap eats out are normal fare. It can leave them missing a home-cooked meal or wanting a dinner beyond the University District. With that in mind, UW alumni and students gathered for the UWAA program Dinner with the Pack, a celebration of shared meals bringing people together. Alumni who live within eight miles of the UW’s Seattle campus volunteered to open up their homes to a group of five to 18 students for a small dinner party. They also had the option of hosting a dinner at a restaurant.
In the program’s second year, 27 alumni/staff and 234 students gathered for food and conversation over two weekends, Feb. 23 & 24 and March 2 & 3. UW student Eshan said of the experience, “It was lots of fun, it was a great opportunity to get to feel more connected to the UW community. It made UW feel more like home.” Leah, an alumni host, shared that sentiment: “Food and home opened everyone’s hearts. The students were wonderful guests and really reached out to me and to each other.”
Making Spring Break count. “We met so many amazing alumni who truly wanted to connect and help us undergraduates. I left the trip feeling very excited about my future post-graduation plans.” — This was UW student Olivia’s take on the Student Career Trek to Washington D.C. over Spring Break.
UWAA’s Student Career Treks allow students to explore a city and its job opportunities with a little help from the Huskies who live there. This Spring Break, one group of students traveled to New York City and another group traveled to Washington D.C., where they visited companies, mingled with alumni and saw the sights together. Organizations they visited represented a wide range of interests and included NASA, Morgan Stanley, SquareSpace and the Library of Congress.
Georgaphy student Ji Hae Hong went on the Career Trek to New York. Read about how this “huge opportunity for networking, learning and growing” opened up career possibilities and contributed to her Husky experience.
Lending a paw to future alumni. Think finding a career is all dog-eat-dog? Not with Huskies@Work, the UWAA’s job shadowing program, now in session. Launched in 2016, this biannual program has matched alumni with students for a day of connection in work places around the Puget Sound region — and even around the world. Alumni have the option of hosting students in-person or virtually.
The program is growing year after year thanks to the rave reviews of students like Yvonne, a fall 2018 participant, who called the program “one of the best things I’ve applied for at the UW.”
