Notes From Community-University Connections Forum

9/10/04, Loma Prieta Room, 4:30 - 6:00PM

With the full support of the Office of the President, community/business leaders, educators, and government officials were invited to campus to discuss the strengths and challenges surrounding their connection with the University. The information obtained from this forum will be channelled into institutional planning discussions as well as the accreditation review process. Thanks so much to those members of the community who participated. From your vantage point we've gained insights that will help us achieve our mission and partner with the community to meet the challenges ahead.

Summary of Group Discussions & Complete Set of Notes from Small Groups

Index Card Exercise

The task for this conversation was to discuss both the strengths and challenges related community-university relations. Questions that guided the discussion included:

Strengths:

• What are the strengths about your current connection(s) to SJSU? That is, what is positive and what is working well?
• Why are they working well?
• What accounts for the strengths?

Challenges:

• What's challenging about your current relationship with the university? That is, what is not working as well it could or should? Why are these not working well?
• How can your relationship with the university be improved?
• What can the university do to help improve the relationship? • What can you do?

Summary of Group Discussions

Summary: Strengths of the Community-University Connection (8 groups reporting)

1. Students (8)
2. Community Outreach (6)
3. Programs and Departments (6)
4. Connecting to Employers/Career Center (4)
5. Geographic Location (4)

Students
The students are an enormous resource to community organizations
SJSU students are quality: smart, capable, responsible, self-directed, with invaluable language skills
Student resumes are a notch above other area school resumes
Students are team oriented and work hard

Community Outreach
Outreach to community is fairly good
SJSU is more connected to the community than it was 15 years ago
SJSU personnel are making a real effort to connect to the community

Programs and Departments
Strong art department, and business and engineering departments
Fantastic engineering program, and the Business School has an outstanding reputation
Teacher Preparation programs are strong

Connecting to Employers/Career Center
Hiring students from SJSU is a strength
The majority of the City of San Jose employees are from SJSU
Praise for the Career Center; they kept in touch with Tax Board even though they were not hiring

Geographic Location
Convenience for students because of the campus location; particularly good for commuters
Location-the heart of Silicon Valley, and being downtown provides opportunities to enhance student life
The close proximity and placement of SJSU and placement of SJSU graduates creates expectations of students and keeps us at the forefront of technology

Summary: Challenges in Community-University Connection (8 groups reporting)

1. Community Outreach (8)
2. Decentralized and Fragmented (6)
3. Lack of a Core Identity and Mission (5)
4. Communication and Information Access (5)
5. Programs, Departments and Disciplines (4)

Community Outreach
SJSU could be more of a leader in terms of solving community problems
Get more K-12 kids onto the university campus; create a more open/welcoming campus for the community
Metropolitan university: Live up to this name; be more a part of the community by engaging both off-campus and on-campus
Not taking full advantage of the excellent opportunities in Silcon Valley
Opportunity/ niche for Nursing to meet the demand for qualified nurses

Decentralized and Fragmented
University is fragmented and decentralized
Colleges seem to be competing against each other. All seem to have different agendas. Appears as if there is a lack of ommunication internally.
Incredibly obvious to the community that the university is not moving together

Lack of a Core Identity and Mission
What is the mission of the university?
Lack of a global identity
Coming into a recruiting position I didn’t know anything about SJSU—need to build an identity.

Communication and Information Access
There is insufficient knowledge of all SJSU resources available to the community
Need to receive information immediately on changes. We have had a break of information with the lose of a representative from SJSU to nearby campuses
Need to have one clearinghouse for access, providing information and answers to the community

Programs, Departments and Disciplines
Its time to expand some of the programs. Service learning needs to come from the professor.
Need more nursing, and nurses with advanced degrees
Lack of enough internship programs

Notes from Table Recorders - Coming ASAP

Table 1

Strengths:

Service-Learning

· Service-Learning Courses bring students out into the community and help the non-profit organizations
· AmeriCorps provides good training/orientation to its members and the service-learners. (It had been more of a burden before)
· Strong staff supervising AmeriCorps members
· Staff in Service-Learning provide hands on service; caring and compassionate
· AmeriCorps Peer Leaders are organized and prepared
· Students who are volunteering or doing service-learning are able to become the organization’s next workforce.

Students

· The students are an enormous resource to community organizations
· Creating a long-term relationship with students (ex: volunteer becomes intern, intern becomes staff member)
· Employ students from SJSU- “brilliant” because they are able to balance so much and keep it all together
Relationship with the Institution
· The relationship goes both ways- students serve the organizations and the organizations are able to educate students, do in-class presentations, etc.
· Good communication with department chairs. They provide access to students and courses.
· Wiggsy Sivertsen has been the “ideal university person”- She is constantly trying to link the community to the university. She demonstrates that the university’s resources are for the community.
· Opportunity for forum is a good step in the right direction.
· New library has been a huge success.

Is SJSU a good neighbor? Part of your organization’s network or an “add-on”?

· Good, but could be much better. Become involved in the neighborhood association; attend meetings (Horace Mann Neighborhood meetings). Provide a representative for SJSU.
· Further integration is necessary. Currently organizations do not see SJSU as an integral part of their network base. Seen as an “add-on” in some respects.
· The AmeriCorps project at SJSU has been a part of community network- has been “caring, compassionate, and transparent”.

Challenges

Faculty

· Community organizations would like a stronger relationship with the faculty.
· It is time to expand some of the programs. Service-Learning needs to come from the professor. Faculty need to be aware of how they can help the local community and provide real life education to their students.
· Professors require different amounts of service hours. Difficult for the organization to track.

SJSU as Leader

· SJSU could be more of a leader in terms of solving community problems. Specifically the problems of the local education system. As an historic ‘Normal School’, SJSU should take more responsibility for the inequities within the education system in Silicon Valley.
· SJSU could be more aware of what is going on in the community around it (ex: Closure of San Jose Medical Center)
· Be a visionary in the community
· SJSU could deliver its expertise (offering workshops to community/train the trainer type events)
· SJSU member: People’s university should be concerned about the people.
· Concept of education as a public good.

SJSU Infrastructure/Resources

· SJSU member: no infrastructure to talk across disciplines. Within individual colleges it is more visible but as an institution it is lacking
· Parking
· University is fragmented/decentralized. What is the mission?
· Increased community contribution can lead to increased fundraising
· SJSU is not taking advantage of community resources (example: holding a class on the Vietnam war or geriatric care in the John XXIII Senior Center where students get to see and interact with the topic they are studying).
SJSU Image/Outreach
· Get more K-12 kids onto the college campus- create a more open/welcoming campus for the community.

Table 2

Strengths

SJSU STUDENTS are quality: smart, capable, responsible, self-directed. Note that 3/4 community participants were SJSU graduates
SJSU STUDENTS are “of the community” and have invaluable language skills
STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS are commencing to serve the community

INSTRUCTORS are generally supportive: promoting organizations/needs to students

OUTREACH to community is fairly good
PERSONAL RESPONSE of SJSU members to us can be good – and enjoyable

POTENTIAL for community partnerships is great:
Example: collaboration with Nursing to meet regional health occupation needs

NETWORKING with other SJSU programs and with other community organizations can be a benefit of partnerships

Challenges

KNOWLEDGE of all SJSU resources available to community

INSUFFICIENT FUNDS for faculty to (fully) support organizations or causes
CONTINUOUS CONNECTIONS with departments or faculty over transient students
SAME with Student Organization moderators or officers
INCONSISTENCY with students’ service-learning, serious students vs. the purposeless

ENTRÉE to persons, programs, resources can be difficult to find
Example: tapping language department or faculty for support to no avail
BUILDING COLLABORATION can be a slow and impaired process

OWNERSHIP toward community programs needed to sustain them over years
Ex: IRS VITA Lab existed 4 years then was dropped by Business Club

COMPETITION between departments/programs for individual gain is detrimental

FUNDRAISING requests have been disorganized, singular, competitive
ACCOUNTABILITY of funds, tracking of dollars is poor
2 Examples: an endowed chair and football stadium expenditures

LEADERSHIP is often lacking; faculty joins clubs (Rotary) or boards then don’t show
Ex: Business Community perception of SJSU interest/involvement is poor

FOOTBALL is a concern of the greater community who wants to see it stay

To Improve

ONE CLEARINGHOUSE for access, information and answers for the community

TWO LEVELS of INTERACTION: appropriate a university or personal response
COHESIVENESS – UNITY – COLLABORATION in approaches to community

UNIVERSITY ADVANCEMENT is improving RFP and fundraising endeavors

RESEARCH DATA needs to be easily accessible and shared with community

INCREASE FACULTY salaries and/or release time for greater civic engagement

METROPOLITAN University: live up to this name, be more a part of the community by engaging both off-campus and on-campus

RAISE the BELL TOWER: make SJSU stand out and stand above its community, overcome being a commuter campus, host more on-campus activities, become a vibrant center seven days a week

Table 3

Strengths of SJSU, Positives

Campus

• SJSU really looks like a university now. Closing San Carlos was a great move for the University and the city.
• The Joint Library project. Great for students and teachers. It means that students come to campus repeatedly during their K-12 years, not just once as a visit.
• Convenience for students because of the campus location. Particularly good for commuters.
• Service to the community
  Activities of the Center for Service Learning and classes which have a service component.
• SJSU students coming to the public schools and working with the children
• Gear Up, 21st Century, and other programs
• SJSU is more connected to the community than it was 15 years ago.
• Appreciate programs that have K-12 students come to campus.
• There is a great band camp
• Teacher Preparation
  SJSU is a great source of teachers for the local schools. Great teacher preparation.
• Because most SJSU students already live in the area, they have worked out a way to afford housing. Can’t recruit teachers from out of the area because of housing costs.

Program quality

• The Music Department is outstanding
• Teacher preparation is strong
• Good training in engineering and business
• Other comments
  A university for students who otherwise couldn’t go to college.
• Facilitates transition from the community colleges to the university.
• Good to have a 4-year-college program that students can pursue without leaving home.
• Challenges/Things in need of improvement.

Outreach

• Many of today’s high school students need more outreach to guide them toward college and through the application process.
• Need a summer science camp.
• Need more summer activities that brings students to the campus for a week or more.
• Starting outreach in 9th grade is too late.
• University bureaucracy
  Incredible number of hoops for prospective students to get through.
• Processes seem obscure and inconvenient.
• Hard to collaborate with SJSU. Can be done at the level of individual professors, but collaboration with the institution is difficult.

Other comments

• Wish that service to community counted more in the tenure and promotion process.
• Flake factor working with student volunteers. Volunteers don’t have the same buy-in and commitment as employees.
• Why not move to division III in football
• Long-term season ticket holders who are not also substantial donors are not treated well.
• Not one of these long-term residents of the area could remember hearing or reading the phrase, “The metropolitan university of the Silicon Valley.”
  

Table 4

Strengths

• CSU Conference
  • Informational
    Great presentations
• Transfer Day
  • Personable
    Articulate
    Good material
    Great discussions
    Wanted to talk to every student
• Transfer Admission Agreement
  • Appreciated by students
    Liked by students
    Used by students
• Great communication with counselors
  • Available
    Respond right away
• Campus publications are excellent
  • Excellent
    Articulate
    #1
• Strong Art department, Business and Engineering departments
• Articulation Officer at SJSU
  • Facilitates our knowledge
• TA program
  • Majority of our students use it
    Students get priority registration if they meet the 4
    Admission fee waiver
• SJSU personnel is making a real effort to connect to the community
• Having good students in the field
• Hiring from SJSU

Challenges

• Superintendent Metropolitan Education District – We are an alternative to college. We want a relationship with SJSU that would allow people from SJSU to come and talk with our students to motivate them to go to college.
• CSU’s are currently looking at alternative schools – they are currently looking at students who have chosen a different direction.
• Need more nursing/ Need more nurses with advance degrees
• Need Out Reach from SJSU – Twenty year Out Reach program ended earlier this year and we are worried.
  • SJSU transfer numbers are dropping in the Community Colleges
    We need the presence of SJSU on our campuses
• Need forgivable loan program for teachers – Recruit future teachers from Eastside Union High Schools – model from Santa Clara University
• Need to know what courses our students need to take to prepare for SJSU
• Need to receive information immediately on changes – We have had a break of information with the lost of a representative from SJSU on our campuses.
• Need a name of who to speak too
  • In relationship to information regarding our students
    In relationship to information to our counselors
• Need evaluators to be accessible to Community Colleges to answer transferability and articulation questions about courses from other colleges and universities – privates and out of state.
• International student transfer transcript

Table 5

Strengths

· SJSU plays an important role in improving economic opportunities in San Jose- Example: Participation of the College of Science in the Bioscience Project
· SJSU provides educational opportunities for current employees of City of San Jose, …
· Some SJSU students majoring in criminal justice work as interns with San Jose Police Department (e.g. Crime Analysis Lab).
· SJSU Health Sciences and Computer Department provide their expertise to the City of San Jose on some projects.
· Some SJSU students have worked as volunteers at tax sites and then joined IRS after their graduation from SJSU.
· SJSU MEP has led a project to introduce civil engineering to girls.
· SJSU provides teaching opportunities for some employees of the City of San Jose.
· Some faculty members from SJSU hotel management have organized panels and seminars.
· Hispanic Advisory Group provides advice to the SJSU President.
· King Library

Challenges and Suggestions

· Lack of a global identity
· Not taking full advantage of the excellent opportunities in Silicon Valley
· Diversity of faculty
· Lack of a good PR
· Lack of a community board (not enough to have just college advisory boards)
· No more talk about SJSU as a Metropolitan University (what has happened to it?)
· SJSU Athletic Program (academic programs vs. athletic program)
· Commuter school (New on-campus housing helps to address this challenge)
· Lack of enough internship programs

Suggestions:

o Participation of the SJSU president in the city’s major events such as the State of the City
o Addressing the community outside the university in the State of the University by the SJSU president
o Hiring more women and underrepresented minority faculty
o Enhancement of programs such as “Community Service Learning”
o Improving the University PR
o Providing opportunities for participation of faculty in projects funded by the city, … (e.g. identifying faculty experts)
o Establishing a community board (include business owners, …)
o Participation of SJSU band in parades

Table 6

Strengths about your current connection with SJSU

• Career fairs. Well organized. Excellent students. Sharp students. Well prepared. Good at following up.
• Student resumes are a notch above other area school resumes. Would like to see more students at the career fairs.
• Competing against top schools and do well against them.
• Quality students. Commuter students understand the work world. More mature.
• Well-prepared students. SJSU prepares them for practical purpose. They graduate and are ready to go – advantage.
• Praise for career center. The Career Center kept in touch with Tax Board even though Tax Board was not hiring. Gave example of graduate of SJSU who started as an IT intern with Tax Board and now after only 2 years, has worked his way up to large projects. Would like to visit classrooms.
• Trying to build relationships with professors. Encourage more involvement from professors with employers.
• Try to expand connections with employers beyond career fair.

Greatest Strength

• Location – heart of Silicon Valley. Possibilities for students to get internships.
• Location – downtown, opportunity to enhance student life.
• High caliber, qualified grads.
• Innovative students. Definite difference seen between SJSU grads and other area schools.
• Administration is strong. Leadership is good.
• Students are team-oriented and work hard.
• Recruiters may prefer Berkley or Stanford but SJSU students/grads compete just fine.

Challenges

• Colleges seem to be competing against each other. Business Alumni Association in particular. All seem to have different agendas. Appears as if there is a lack of communication internally.
• Disconnected from corporations.
• Alumni Association is basically “defunct” due to low membership. Potential members are lost here on campus before the students even leave the campus.
• How connected is the President with the Alumni? What the university wants to do is not communicated to the community.
• Incredibly obvious to the community that the university is not moving together.
• Disconnected. A lot of leaders.
• Voice Mail. “They tell me they need a warm body.” Related to Admissions in particular. Gave example of student accepted and then received a letter stating they were denied – “no one to call about it”. Leaves a bad image. Why choose SJSU after an incident like this?
• Status within the community. SJSU has an “inferiority complex” as relates to Berkley, Stanford, Santa Clara. Example: Mostly negative press. What about the good grads?
• Identity. What’s going on with football?
• Coming into recruiting position “I didn’t know anything about SJSU”. Build identity. SJSU IS different from Stanford and Berkley.
• Admissions- ask 10 different people and you get 10 different answers. Admissions is not promoting university. Not doing a good job. Leaves a bad image.

Specifically about SJSU website

• Informative. Got what I needed to know such as what’s going on on campus, how to post a job with career center.
• Web site doesn’t differentiate us. But information is there.
• Functional. It would be nice to communicate where the university is going.
• Add a list of prominent alumni.

Suggestions

• Give alumni a say in what university is doing. Bring alumni back to the campus.
• Alumni-hosted events just for students to mingle with alumni.
• Incorporate all communication from different colleges in one magazine instead of magazines from each college. Referred to example from UCLA.
• Ask the people what they want in order to form operations.
• Publicize student successes. Bring success back to SJSU. Put those successes out to the students.
• Go out and actively engage the companies in the area.
• List department contacts on the web site.
• Encourage faculty to reach out to the corporations.
• Define vision of what university wants to be. Publicize what does Kassing want to accomplish. Publicize what are we doing to help students and employers.
• More outreach to companies to create connections.
• Would like to see more networking events like this.
• Better educate the staff on Public Relations.
• Get better connection with Alumni. Bridge gap with alumni and employers. Bring them back.
• University could step in to provide State agencies with training that budget cuts have eliminated.
  

Table 7

The County nursing program has very strong ties with SJSU nursing school.

*SJSU's nursing chair, Jayne Cohen, is responsive well to the needed skills from graduating nursing students.

*Two way cooperation with the countyEarly retired clinical nurses teach as instructors at SJSU.

* High demand for nurses in CA.
Shortage resulted from closure of nursing schools in the state starting about a decade and a half ago. CC started filling the need, but the demand is for higher qualified nurses with four years college education

*Health care is shifting from hospital based care to day/out patient /home care. This required more well rounded nurses. Than what a 2 year program can provide

* SJSU declined the number of students in nursing instead of increasing the number of graduating nurses
.
* Raise salaries for nursing faculty. A graduating young nurse earns more than prof.

* Opportunity/ niche for Nursing to meet the demand for qualified nurses. - initiate a re-certification program in nursing for nurses and physician assistants who immigrated to our region from countries like Mexico, South America, and Eastern Europe and who were Doctors or certified nurses in their home countries. This is currently done by SFSU( from Theresa - AmeriCorp)

*SJSU lacks recognition for well equipped diversity failing to recognise rising educational level among immigrants. For example UC Santa Cruz works with such groups.

*Open up the university to the neighborhood.

* NHS SV has superb cooperation with CSL providing great opportunities to SJSU students for community out-reach. SJSU students are much more welcome in neighborhood outreach than employees of the community service organizations.

* SJSU students are effective ambassadors to the university while doing community service with NHS SV. CSL is extremely helpful and well organized to direct/connect the students with appropriate projects.

* SJSU should take advantage of housing loans and other opportunities NHS SV can make available for faculty.

Table 8

Strengths

• You’re in our backyard. SJSU has a strong following of major corporations. The close proximity and placement of SJSU graduates pulls of expectations of students and keeps us at the forefront of technology. Silicon Valley has expectations of prospective employees which influences SJSU.
• I have been involved with SJSU for almost thirty years in a fundraising capacity. The problems we have at the competition level in athletics affects fundraising for athletics. However, there is a feeling of good will towards athletics because it is a conduit for a lot of people to give back. We have to hook people in to get them to know more about us and athletics is a way to do that.
• Business school has an outstanding reputation and we employ many SJSU graduates in our firm. They have gone around the world in responsible positions. The business school can compete successfully in the accounting program.
• As a Hispanic Chamber, we work to develop programs to impact Central America. The working arrangement with SJSU is strong which helps us advance international outreach.
• Fantastic engineering school. So many engineers come out of SJSU and are employed in Silicon Valley. We need to get them to return and increase their participation as alumni. Lots of engineers being produced by SJSU.
• Efficiency and speed of reactions to anything you want. I can get a response and get connected to the appropriate people easily which is facilitated by the emerging technology that the school is using. A thorough, efficient and speedy response to inquiries.
• Great business school.
• MESA has helped us increased the diversity of our employee candidates. Through MESA we recently hired a SJSU graduate. He is great and he now recruits for us and is a strong SJSU advocate. Great conduit to have a pool of good candidates and an easy relationship. This gives SJSU greater visibility. Given our location in Silicon Valley and the competition for employees, this is an important win-win (for us and SJSU).
• Personal contact. SJSU people are good, they know what they are doing and they have a passion about it.
• Involvement of SJSU with Hispanic Chamber to outreach to Central America. This will have a huge economic impact to Silicon Valley since billions of dollars of equipment will need to be purchased in Central America and collaborative efforts of SJSU will benefit the Valley.
• Biggest strength is that there is no longer a wall between the University and the City. The fact that we are self-examining is important for other strengths to evolve.
• Collaboration between SJSU and City in building the library. As a citizen, being able to mix with students, talk to students generates more interest and support.
• Used to be a commuter school. But, the new housing village will generate school spirit and an interest in becoming a loyal alum.

Challenges

• Ability to hire minorities in accounting field. SJSU needs to find a way to enroll minority students into the accounting field.
• SJS has so many wonderful programs, but they are not integrated and thus not supported. Need to encourage relationships across colleges and majors. Need to improve communication and collaboration across colleges and majors without having territories. (e.g., MESA can bring students to accounting).
• Center for Entrepreneurship – there’s a wall and faculty out of that immediate function aren’t paying attention. Various disciplines think stand alone but they need to share best practices.
• Hispanic community sees low enrollment at SJSU doesn’t reflect the population. Challenge to attract Hispanic community. SJSU is doing away with outreach and focusing on out-of-state and international areas which widens the gap. The Hispanic community is not adequately reflected in industry/business, politics and SJSU. We (Hispanic community) have talented youth and SJSU is not helping to motivate them to attend college or direct them to majors (e.g., accounting). The SJSU faculty and leadership is not addressing outreach programs to motivate youth in under-represented areas. They will also need financial assistance. They will also need mentoring and role models. The staffing (faculty, staff and administrators) needs to be reflective of the community.
• SJSU is unfriendly to students. SJSU doesn’t nurture students. Graduation rates are less than 40%. From the day they come through the door, students need to feel they are part of a larger community and wanted in that community. Establish a model of nurturing students to increase retention. MUSE doesn’t reach all freshmen. It needs to expand to all incoming students. The model needs to include: the idea of being an alumni and giving back; track students through all their school years with faculty across disciplines being involved; concentrate on lower division students to boost retention rates and positively affect donor rates. Develop a grant proposal to go to major foundations to get money to help develop the program. Hold faculty accountable for nurturing and connecting students to SJSU. Faculty needs to be involved in more than just teaching and giving grades.
• Grants and state funding are important to serve masses of students. However SJSU can also build resources through the efforts of students – their PASSION. Have every student in a minority/under-represented group, make a personal call to every incoming freshmen in the same under-represented group. Call the incoming freshmen and say welcome; I’m your buddy. I will mentor you, help you be successful here at SJSU. Use existing minority students to reach/mentor/nurture incoming students. Then they will start also bringing in non-minority students and SJSU will become a community with a pool of students that are passionate about SJSU. The model is for your students to create a system of passionate people to engage students.
• Even with the new Housing village, SJSU is still perceived as a commuter school. It is important to focus on how to make the commuters and all students feel connected. Need to establish at a personal level ways to connect (e.g., the mentor who makes a personal call so it’s not so sterile). Women seniors all want a connection, a network, a mentor. Faculty should be accountable to emphasize and include in their curriculum ways to help students connect (e.g., mentoring, providing information on clubs/networks to help students).
• Once graduates go back into the community, they don’t brag about having a degree from SJSU. SJSU needs to build more stature/pizzazz and involve the alumni more. It is an honor (as an alum) to be personally asked/invited to participate. Ask the alumni, give them opportunities to participate in activities.
• 54% of SJSU students are from Santa Clara county. That’s a tremendous amount of people that will become alumni. SJSU must get alumni to participate more. The Mercury News prints a lot of negative articles about SJSU. Publicize more positive things in the Mercury News. This past Greek homecoming was effective and it encouraged people to attend the football game and renewed school spirit. It was fun! Give alumni an invitation to serve on a committee. At USC they have a Board of Fellows (approximately 150). It’s an honor to be a part of it. I had to make a commitment ($ and time). It is a way to build active, giving alumni. Create a unique high-level organization for alumni to be invited to join and asked to contribute $ and time. The financial contribution can start at $3,000-$4,000 and increase. This organization of alumni can help raise money for scholarship and give them out in the communities to build the outreach efforts of SJSU.
• Fundraising is too fragmented at SJSU. You are going after the same people. SJSU needs a focus for fundraising.
• Invite alumni to serve and give. Provide plenty of opportunities to serve and give. Advise alumni that there are volunteer opportunities – advertise them. For example, there used to be a President’s Council that required some financial contribution. If you invest financially, you are more likely to put the time into the activity. If you put time into an activity, you are more likely to invest money – it’s always a win-win to involve alumni.
• From day 1, start telling students to give back and require community service. Plant the seeds early and often for students to give-back to the community. In-service training is needed for professors on how to start the conversation, keep it going and be accountable for it.
• Need a paid staff to develop alumni chapter(s). One Washington Square is good, but still passive. It’s not personal.
• What’s the hook that brings you back here. At USF the minute you graduate you are invited to all alumni activities – gala, community service so that you keep the sense of “my university” and the ownership of responsibility to give-back.
• Provide opportunities for seniors to contact alumni in their industry. Networking is vital to students preparing to start their career. Get students involved at an early stage with the buddy system – not just students as buddies but also connecting them with alumni.
• Provide outreach assistance to help (prospective and current) students get scholarships. It is overwhelming filling out the paperwork and they need assistance.
• Revisit the idea of Spartan Camp, a freshmen camp where they come for a week before school starts to meet with counselor and they get indoctrinated into school spirit and how to make it through SJSU.
  

Information from index card exercise:

Participants asked to write down 3 words descriptive of SJSU. They were then asked to write down the one think they want us to know about their connection to SJSU.

Responses to the 3-word description component of the exercise are summarized in 3 categories: a) predominantly positive, b) mixed (pos/neg), c) overall neutral.

Predominantly Positive

• helpful, caring, community-oriented
• educational, socially just
• diverse university
• vast community resource
• serve south bay
• committed, talented, enthusiastic
• exciting, transferable, cultural
• great place to learn
• opportunity for future
• resource, outreach, collaboration
• community resource, historic, diversity incubator
• education, unity, opportunity
• education, community, diversity
• future, economics, leadership
• local, engineering, smart students
• leader, innovator, trust
• education, friendly, easily accessible faculty

Mixed (pos/neg)

• big, fragmented
• big, public Univ, diverse students
• big, employee feeder, remote
• educational institution, commuter college
• understated, potential, wonderful
• commuter campus, great physical improvements, addressing diversity
• large, commuter univ, multi-cultural eclectic
• decentralized, searching, desiring
• unsung, basic/practical (not cutting edge), local
• art, engineering, bureaucracy
• local, engineering, commuter
• disconnected, disorganized, institution

Overall Neutral

• state, urban, university
• urban, friendly, preparation
• higher, education, organization
• metropolitan university services
• 1st generation school
• state university, local connection-community, spartans

Below are the responses from participants regarding the one thing they want SJSU to know about their connection with the university.

• We would like to partner more with SJSU in joint activities to end poverty and homelessness
• Sometimes (often actually) feel more disconnected than connected. Strong desire to help make SJSU people have more pride in the University
• We enjoy a helpful, positive, working relationship with SJSU but we need to expand and deepen the connections and develop more programs together
• We have made a great connection with SJSU through Americorp program which has become an important addition to our agency’s programs. Carlee Howie & Michael Fallon are wonderful
• Alumni; funder of many programs through valley foundation; enjoy sports; worked with Spartan Foundation for many years organizing fund raising efforts
• We need not only volunteers in our regular programs but assistance with all of the expertise SJSU has including fund raising, program development, publicity, and so much more.
• What connection can be developed to meet workforce needs for health care delivery system via community colleges & SJSU?
• Great source of talented students that are looking for new challenging opportunities to apply their skills
• Connection? Nonexistent.
• We love having SJSU students at our school (elementary) and we want our students to think now about going to college... So, when they get to know your students that is a step!
• Community partner with service learning; alumni; former employee; looking at way to get university better connected to community
• Community college articulation - kudos to Clyde Brewer; future teacher prep - what/how are we going to advise transfer students; transfer agreements - excellent outreach personnel; Is Clyde’s replacement being trained to gleam Clyde’s wisdom? Please clarify teacher prep courses.
• SJSU needs to know that through organizations like the metropolitan education dist. you can encourage students to come to SJSU. Metro ed is a career technical education and adult ed dist. that serves 6 school districts in the silicon valley.
• That we send a multitude of students to this campus for a quality education.
• We need representatives (outreach) at Cabrillo College to keep our transfer students informed and interested in SJSU. You’re our largest CSU transfer university.
• Who we are as an organization - Santa Clara Valley Water District; What are our educational needs for our workforce at SCVWD; how can we support SJSU?
• My mother, brother, husband, and I are all alumni of SJSU. I am now a SJ councilmember and am excited by the opportunity to leverage resources and for partnerships.
• I am in a position to offer help, suggestions, and assistance to provide a better link between the students and the community; my daughter will be going here in spring 05.
• SJSU can provide IRS student volunteers for our VITA program to prepare simple basic tax returns to low-income community and receive college credits. In return student volunteers get experience in tax preparation that they can use on resumes for jobs. Real life experience.
• Bio-science; economic development
• Connection is through service learning placements; but, am also alumni and live in neighborhood.
• Graduate, involved over the years with business school, donor, supporter, hired many students; observer.
• A proud alumni of engineering program and greek system; supporter of athletic scholarship program.
• Student, teacher, President alumni association; volunteer fund-raiser for athletic scholarships
• Currently with the hispanic council in SJSU
• We as a chamber partner with SJSU and provide mentoring programs.
• My connection is totally dependent on personal contacts and involvement with EWE. I’m ready for more - it’s fun!
• Seen as a resource center for technology transfer; collaboration through college of Education and Engineering over 25 years; MESA board of adv.
• SJSU Graduate, Faculty & community activist
• Alumnus, alumni board member, employer
• Trying to source qualified graduating students to help our organization succeed
• University provider for student hiring; franchise tax board
• We are a local engineering company looking to hire top students from your university