Past students lauded on ‘alumni wall’
During Manawatu¯ College’s orientation week earlier this year, Waynne Napier, the lead pastoral care teacher, came up with the idea of setting up an alumni wall on the school grounds.
“Robertson House was focusing on leadership and [we] thought it would be useful to look at past students and their successes and leadership roles.”
The concept of an alumni wall is to show current students they can succeed; to inspire them to have a growth mindset by seeing others who have attended Manawatu¯ College and created success for themselves.
Teachers Chelsea Hickey, Kara Lummis, Waynne Napier and Annie Tatana are working on the project and have already begun making professional profiles for the alumni who have responded to requests to participate.
“We are using all forms of communication to reach out to past students, from email and conversations to putting up Facebook posts to reach out to those who may have moved overseas,” Hickey said.
By using social media, the college has even had past students’ families giving them information about achievements and other aspects of their lives.
The college is asking alumni for an image of themselves, details about their career achievements ( academic, vocational or professional) and other interesting information, like if they’ve travelled for work, what they consider to be their success and how they got there.
“The image . . . will be for when the wall becomes a reality, with each student having their own section with a photo, their names and their graduate year, with a small blurb of their achievements,” Hickey said.
There will eventually be a related page added to the school website as well, with an in-depth write-up about each participating alumnus.
Manawatu¯ College alumni speak at assemblies to share their personal journey and success with students, and the college celebrates and promotes graduations of past pupils from universities and polytechnics.
“We always post achievements of alumni on our school social media accounts, newsletters and yearbooks,” Hickey said. The wall would be a permanent reminder of their successes.
The college hopes to start the alumni wall this year. If you are an ex-student who would like to be part of this celebration of being “Proudly Foxton”, email Chelsea Hickey: chickey@manawatucollege.school. nz.