Re-engaging alumni priority of new alumni office director and endowment fund manager Taculin
by Rex Godinez Ortega, Office of the Chancellor
“I’ve heard of you,” said a pleasantly surprised Silliman University President Ben S. Malayang III when he realized it was MSU-IIT Prof. Alquine Roy F. Taculin who was seated in front of him.
“You’re supposed to be a very good dean!” Malayang told the 35 year-old former dean of the Institute’s School of Computer Studies who was there last August to benchmark at Silliman’s alumni office.
Taculin was just designated acting director of the Office for Alumni Relations and Placement (OARP) last August 1, and he wasted no time to gather ideas at Silliman when he heard IIT’s Office of Publication and Information (OPI) was going there.
“Benchmarking at big universities is one of the first things that we should be doing,” Taculin said as he admitted the Silliman visit would not be his only trip to other schools for the year.
Taculin said there was a need for MSU-IIT to observe and learn as much as it could from others on how to engage their own alumni, especially now when the Institute had only recently created its own Endowment Fund Management Office (EFMO) that would rely – in a big way – on the support of IIT graduates.
Needless to say, Taculin also heads the EFMO, having been hand-picked in June by Chancellor Sukarno D. Tanggol to fill the post after his deanship ended.
Tanggol has especially been vocal about the establishment of the endowment fund to give MSU-IIT an option in capital to be utilized for its expansion needs and to further its operating process.
Now that the EFMO is there, Taculin’s job is to attract investments and donations from donors and both IIT employees and alumni.
The key, according to Taculin, is to use the resources at the OARP to “re-engage” IIT’s alumni and eventually get them interested enough to contribute to the development of their alma mater, as is the case for other big universities.
“Our alumni’s impression of IIT is not good; they have become disinterested in us,” he said with concern.
The EFMO was created this year via Board of Regents Resolution No. 20. The committee who made the proposal was spearheaded by Taculin’s predecessor at the OARP, Dr. Rhodora S.N. Englis, who has since gone on Sabbatical leave.
As endowment fund manager, Taculin is tasked primarily to organize fund-raising activities and to prepare investment plans and the endowment fund portfolio that will be presented to prospective donors.
He will also be occupied with the creation and maintenance of the endowment fund website, as well as in the production of campaign materials such as brochures and flyers that will have to be given out.
“We are still prioritizing which tasks to do, but formulating marketing strategies is definitely up there,” Taculin said.
These efforts at developing action plans include those for the OARP where Taculin is also busy organizing alumni data for easy retrieval, enhancing internal operations, and working on rebranding the office and the services it offers.
A big part of theses services is alumni placement, which Taculin wants to give a big makeover with the establishment of a one-stop shop full of job openings.
As both endowment fund manager and alumni office director, Taculin may soon have to clone himself, save for the fact that the two roles are related.
“It’s just the issue of getting more personnel to help me operate that I’m still struggling with,” he revealed while confessing to paying the one month salary of a staff member whose job order contract was never approved due to budgetary constraints, but whose services he really needed.
Taculin clearly has the vision and the inclination to give his all for the attainment of that vision that make people – the Silliman University President included – sit up and notice.
And it should be safe to say that with Taculin at the helm of both the EFMO and the OARP, all IITians will soon be moved to re-establish links and finally fulfill their duties to their alma mater.