Rodman Council Minutes September 29, 2010
Focus on Budget
 Budget has been cut – no money from e-school
o Need new sources of funding
o Start an endowment to solve problem long term
 Earn interest every year
o Build up and improve contact, alumni contacts
o Update program information
o Maintain alumni contact
 Gala dinner at alumni weekend
 Consequence of temporary economic situation, but calls for long-term sustainable plan
o Opportunity to do something great for the program
 Connect alum to program
 Strengthen the program through experiences, connections, and resources of
alum
 Suggested Committees
o Collin Leslie
 $1 million suggested endowment goal
 To keep program going as well as expand it
 In charge of alumni gala in spring
 formal event
 show what program does, what program has to offer, why they should
contribute
o individual projects, rodman projects, what are we doing?
 Social aspects, planning aspects, pull initiatives of other groups into this
one big event
o Liz
 Reaching alums through telethon
 Need help both planning and making calls
 Verify information for alumni, gage interest in events, their involvement in
interacting with the program
o Carolyn
 Rodman Media
 Update publications, website, Rodman video clip, compiling annual
report – what’s been happening
 Prospective student booklet
 Pamphlet or booklet for corporations
 Media contacts – press releases, etc
o Manya
 Compiling info about current Rodmans and alum
 What they did and what they do, ideas, etc
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Kelly
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 Where are they now?
Giant database of Rodmans
Make an image of “this is the Rodman program” – what has the Rodman
program done for alum?
Corporations outreach
Start with report of all projects funded by Lockheed
List of what we want to do short term
Writing grants, networking, etc
Work out details and get information on the details of establishing an
endowment and working with corporations
Questions
o Gala – how do we pay for that, what will the interest be?
 Collin has experience organizing gala events
 It’s about establishing a connection, not a reunion
 Establish connections such as sending interns to a corporation in return for a
grant
 Show alum what the program has done and what it can become (vision)
o What is the goal of the gala?
 What we do now and show what graduated rodmans are doing
 Inviting alumni and “friends” of the program (Greg Olsen, etc)
 Fundraising event
o What is the approach for the grants? How will we stand out?
 To get a grant, you have to present a vision
 We need to decide on a cohesive vision – sustainability is a choice, but very
widely used
o Where are we looking for guidance/tips?
 Virginia engineering foundation, Alumni association, open to ideas
 Ask Jeff scholars, etc
o What kind of contact are we making?
 Telethon – open lines of communication (not initially ask for money but
establish the connection, verify contact info)
 Timeline – try to start phone calls within a month
 Need to draft conversation, have compilation of available information
for when they ask questions
o What are we doing to make sure that future alums stay connected?
 Goal to increase rodman connections after 1st year
 Current program focused on 1st year and perhaps social later that
 What connects you after program?
o Once we get this going, make the connection sustainable so it
can become a continuing system
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 Focus on the connection, not just the money (relationships)
 Opportunity for benefiting from alum experience and connections
o Tying the Rodman program into undergrad research
 Should we establish a certain portion going to research or focus more heavily on
it?
 Develop what was the Rodman Sustainability grant
 Perhaps not just sustainability, but offer across majors and more heavily
focus on Rodmans
o Improve annual or biannual newsletter for alums
 Re-establish, more widely distribute
o Need to work on fixing media and improve visibility to prospective and accepted
students
Establish short and long term Rodman goals we know how to share and have an established
direction