The Asian alumni community includes those who identify as Asian, Asian American, Native American, and Pacific Islander. Latinx alumni include people of Latin American descent.
To gather their input, Bowdoin opened listening sessions for all respective identifying graduates. Those in attendance were from class years spanning the early 1970s to 2022.
While these focus groups generated many complex reflections, impactful insights, and inspiring ideas, they represented just "the beginning of the storytelling, the start of the journey," said Joycelyn Blizzard, who is the director of multicultural alumni engagement for the Office of Development and Alumni Relations (DAR).
Blizzard said that the College is grateful for those who participated, and that she and her colleagues have already begun to implement some of the recommendations from the report, including special Homecoming gatherings and opportunities to engage with College leadership.
DAR is committed to engaging alumni from all backgrounds and ethnicities through opportunities and programs that connect alumni with each other, with the College, and with students. "Including the vast variety of voices and perspectives in everything we do helps build and strengthen our alumni community," Blizzard said.
Reflections and recommendations
The College partnered with Mindbridge Center and Up With Community to help facilitate the listening sessions. The following are some key findings.
Latinx Alumni Listening Sessions
The Latinx focus groups stressed the importance of increasing alumni visibility and building a more representative history of the College.
The report summarized several of their recommendations:
- We should look for opportunities to elevate Latino voices through storytelling (e.g., Latinx alumni spotlights, “Bowdoin Through the Years,” and oral history projects).
- Latinx alumni, especially recent graduates, are interested in looking to Bowdoin for career and professional development.
- We should continue to make space for alumni to share their experiences, to connect with one another and their alma mater, and to invest in building stronger relationships with the Latinx alumni community.
"Focus group participants...expressed both the challenges of navigating Bowdoin as a member of the Latinx community, and a deep appreciation for the education they received. They were motivated to be part of transformative change that would benefit fellow alumni, as well as current and future Latinx students," Mindbridge reports.
Asian Alumni Listening Sessions
Themes that emerged from the focus groups with Asian alumni included their desire to deepen a sense of community, work across generational and ethnic lines, and be part of building a stronger Bowdoin experience for students.
The report summarized several recommendations:
- The College should seek to generate more intergenerational career and mentoring connections to support cross-community alumni engagement.
- We should shift the culture of alumni engagement to community building.
- We should gather, honor, and share the history of Asian, Asian-American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander alumni.
- We should explore the connection between social justice and efforts around diversity, equity and inclusion.
- We should build cultural events in collaboration with AA/NH/PI communities.
"Focus group participants raised...concerns...not to tear Bowdoin down, but rather to help be a part of building Bowdoin up," the report explains. "Participants gave of their time generously to help Bowdoin enrich its engagement with future students and alumni because they want to help the school succeed."
The respective alumni groups will begin collective conversations in November to build the foundational opportunities and programs that will foster stronger connections with fellow alumni and the College for years to come, Blizzard said.
If you’d like to be included in the conversations, please contact the office of Multicultural Alumni Engagement at multiculturalalumni@bowdoin.edu.
