(4) Benchmarking Alumni Engagement Among Doctor of Pharmacy Programs

Objective : To benchmark pharmacy alumni engagement across four metrics – philanthropy, experiential, volunteerism, and communication–and provide a call to action for the standardization of tracking and reporting of alumni engagement across the Academy.

Methods: A cross-sectional survey was developed and distributed to alumni relations personnel from schools and colleges of pharmacy in the United States using Qualtrics®. Alumni personnel were asked to provide the number of living alumni, opinions on the accuracy of the alumni records, databases used, metrics data, alumni relations staffing information, and perceived barriers to alumni engagement.

Results: Twenty-seven surveys were completed, yielding a 19% response rate. 44% percent of respondents indicated pharmacy alumni records were up to date. Communication was the most reported form of pharmacy alumni engagement, followed by events, philanthropy, and volunteering. 48% of respondents indicated one full-time equivalent was dedicated to pharmacy alumni engagement. All respondents reported barriers to alumni engagement, including successful in-person or virtual attendance, limited staffing or budgets, maintaining an effective database, and engaging alumni via social media. Limitations to this study include a limited response rate, which may be the result of unavailable contact information for alumni relations personnel and the possibility that many programs do not have dedicated staff for pharmacy alumni relations or specifically track pharmacy alumni engagement to any meaningful extent.

Conclusions: Despite limitations, this study provides a preliminary benchmark for four alumni engagement metrics among pharmacy programs and supports a call to action for the consistent tracking and reporting of alumni engagement efforts. This is a vital first step to assist pharmacy programs in developing and optimizing alumni relations efforts and engaging their alumni bases.