{"id":157864,"date":"2020-02-05T08:25:04","date_gmt":"2020-02-05T13:25:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=157864"},"modified":"2020-02-05T10:47:31","modified_gmt":"2020-02-05T15:47:31","slug":"african-american-alumni-council-provides-voice-recruits-young-alums-hosts-events","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2020\/02\/african-american-alumni-council-provides-voice-recruits-young-alums-hosts-events\/","title":{"rendered":"African American Alumni Council Provides a Voice As It Recruits Young Alums, Hosts Events"},"content":{"rendered":"

UConn\u2019s African American Alumni Council plans to hit the refresh button this year with a new drive to attract younger alumni, host more events, and build a strong network to support students as they move through UConn and prepare to enter the workforce.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe really want to get fresh, new perspectives from recent alums, so that we can use new and innovative ways to better service students and our communities,\u201d Council Co-Chair Theresa Hopkins-Staten \u201981 (CLAS), \u201984 JD said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since the late 1990s, the council has raised scholarships, held workshops for middle school students and their parents, and hosted wellness fairs and other community events. Now it hopes to reinvigorate and expand the group as it moves into a new decade.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to help students and young alums tap into our network and build relationships,\u201d Fareed Rasheed \u201908 (CLAS) said. \u201cWe can offer them tons of knowledge and help them navigate their careers, so they are not on their own.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Rasheed and Jason F. Ellis \u201909 (CLAS) plan to use their expertise as event planners to help the group along. Their side business, TNB (There\u2019s Nothing Better), organizes events in Hartford and around the state that bring young professionals together to share ideas, make social and professional connections, and simply have fun.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rasheed said he would like to see the council bridge the gap and attract younger graduates by hosting happy hours, paint nights, and other social events in the greater Hartford area. He said he hopes that the <\/span>younger members could help build the group\u2019s social media presence.<\/p>\n

Tina Beamon \u201994 (CLAS) recently joined the group after she and her husband, Jonathan Beamon \u201994 (CLAS), returned to Storrs for the big 50th anniversary celebration of the H. Fred Simons African American Cultural Center.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe experienced just a flood of memories from our time there. It was wonderful,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd, after hearing the Voices of Freedom gospel choir sing, I turned to my husband and said, \u2018You know what? We should be more connected with students now.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Find out more about the African American Alumni Council by contacting Glenn Cassis, co-chair of the council, at <\/span>glenncassis@comcast.net<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Join the group\u2019s next event, <\/span>a career development brunch and panel discussion<\/a><\/span> called Life After UConn: Connecting your Passion with Purpose, on Feb. 23, 2020 in Storrs.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UConn’s African American Alumni Council is launching a new effort to recruit young alums in 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":157866,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[92,2225,2234],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[1902],"class_list":["post-157864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uconn-hartford","category-uconn-storrs","category-university-life"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-05 14:57:57","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/68"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157864"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157864\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":158126,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157864\/revisions\/158126"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/157866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157864"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=157864"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=157864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}