27-10-2016
ALUMNI; AN ASSOCIATION OF STUDENTS OR AN ASSOCIATION OF OLD (PAST) STUDENTS?

At the commencement of the 2015/2016 academic session, new students of Akanu Ibiam Federal Polytechnic encountered changes and new methods in their registration. Such changes included an online registration on the student portal before the normal manual registration. A new development which generated lots of controversy is the compulsory payment of four thousand, five hundred naira as alumni fee by the new students. This ridiculous payment was explained to comprise of N3000 for ‘development levy’ and N1500 for the alumni vest. Following continued complaints by the students and some open confrontations with the alumni office about the rationale and genuinety of the payment, the fee was reduced to N3000; after a large number of students have already paid the N45000. The idea was that those who paid N4500 were to get the alumni vest while those who paid N3000 will have to pay the N15000 balance when they come for their clearance and then get their vest. Lots of questions have been raised as to the normalcy of this new policy; is it right and ideologically okay for new students of an institution to contribute to or pay for the institution’s alumni which they are not yet a part of? Is it normal for almost all students on campus to put on the alumni vest while still carrying out their activities on campus as present students? And the said alumni fee of N4500, isn’t it too outrageous? Besides, most of the vest given out to students were clearly of substandard quality. According to Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary of Contemporary English, 6th Edition; Alumni are former or past students of a school, college, or university. It also states that a former woman student is an alumna while an alumnus is a former male student. Alumni in all its definition and meaning shows that a person is only qualified to be alumni of a school and belong to alumni of a school only when he/she leaves the school and not while still in the school; where the person is rather still referred to as student. Wikipedia explains Alumni Association to be an association of graduates or more broadly, of former students (alumni); they organize social events, publish newsletters or magazines and raise funds for the organization. It can also be termed ‘The Old Boys Association’. This association offers past students of a school the opportunity to meet and keep in touch with one another. It also serve the purpose of maintaining the welfare of its members and encouraging them to contribute their time, talent and financial support to the growth of their formal institution. In its bid to contribute to the development and growth of its parent institution, the alumni association is not expected to generate or impose the financial requirements on the present students who are yet to be part of the association. Neither is it a “contributory pension scheme” where the students are expected to contribute in advance even before they become members of the association! Generation of funds required for the efficient piloting of the association should be the sole responsibility of its members. The new students should never be made to pay an incongruous and outrageous fee in the guise of financing the alumni association which they are not a part of. In other not to be ‘putting the cart before the horse’, this alumni imposition should be effaced and let the former system be restored where outgoing students were only expected to pay a mild fee of N1600 for the alumni while carrying out their clearance. Failure to do this, and continuous sustenance of this asinine payment will keep students and others concerned asking the question; IS ALUMNI AN ASSOCIATION OF PRESENT STUDENTS OR PAST (FORMER) STUDENTS?
-EBERE CHUKS O. EDEM 27-10-2016