Alumni Abroad Outreach Program (AAOP)

Welcome to the Alumni Abroad Outreach Program – the very first outreach/volunteer program launched within the purview of the still unincorporated Parañaque Science High School Alumni Association (ParSHSAA).

Moving to another country is either a very exciting beginning or a frightening experience to any individuals… that includes our fellow alumni. It can be very challenging as well. As a volunteer in this outreach program, you will primarily help our fellow alumni in addressing such challenge and assist by providing friendly advice that can help them plan their itinerary or give them some insights about their travel destination.

This kit will help you better understand the significance of your individual contribution and give you additional list of possible activities that you may undertake.

Parscian Alumni: Transforming Lives!

The time has finally come that the ParSHSAA begins not only to make a difference but to create its own history with pride. At the outset of its establishment, we are already gaining a strong international presence in our own modest way, with Parscian alumni located around the world and whose numbers are expected to grow in the coming years.

Becoming an alumni volunteer is one step that enables us to transform lives. Through volunteer service, we dissociate ourselves from apathy and we promote service to fellow alumni.

This kit is designed to help you remain committed to meeting the needs of each other and encourage you to further contribute to the fulfillment of our Association’s vision-mission.

Getting Started

One of the first things you will need to do as a volunteer for the Alumni Abroad Outreach Program is to allow the following personal information to be posted in our weblog:

1. Your complete name and nickname,2. Your preferred email address, and3. The city/state/country/region where you reside.

In so doing, you hold out to your fellow alumni that you are available and willing to be contacted by email to respond to any inquiries about the city/state/country/region where you currently reside. In short, you have volunteered to tell your fellow alumni that you are there to help.

Receiving and Responding to Emails

When you receive an email pertinent to this outreach program, the initial and mandatory information you should look for are: (a) the complete name of the email sender; and (b) his/her batch affiliation.

For our purpose, this is a standard operating procedure. If the sender fails to introduce himself/herself, you should first demand for such information before directly answering the

question/s. The only exception is: if you already know the person emailing you.

Upon meeting the above requirement, that’s the appropriate time to answer whatever questions have been emailed to you.

As a volunteer, you are expected to observe certain norms and/or give extra consideration in setting your tone, length of response, and the like. If you are the type of person who responds to questions as short as “yes” or “no” and “okay”, you are “strongly encouraged” to be more elaborate to the extent you let your fellow alumni feel you are an accommodating volunteer. But you may likewise avoid writing a novel in response to a question that only requires a brief answer.

The rule of thumb in writing your response can be likened to a mini-skirt, i.e. it should be short enough to be interesting, but long enough to keep the essential.

Making Phone Calls and/or Meeting Face-to-Face

Depending on how familiar or how strange you are to the email sender as well as depending on the surrounding circumstances at the time you receive the email, making a phone call or meeting face-to-face with your fellow alumni in your city/state/country/region is a second step to staying connected within the context of our Alumni Abroad Outreach Program.

As for making phone calls, since you are the volunteer, you are in a more suitable position to initiate disclosing your own preferred contact number and specific time you can be contacted – should the need to contact you arises. (But you are not obliged to do so if you don’t feel like doing so.)

As for meeting face-to-face, (again…) since you are the volunteer, you are in a more suitable position to initiate offering yourself and your time to meet up with your fellow alumni. (But you are not obliged to do so if you don’t feel like doing so.)

As always, your safety is a priority. Be sure to take all precautionary measures that will ensure your safety especially if you intend to meet someone for the first time. As an accepted volunteer whose name and email have been posted in our weblog, it is tantamount to assuring our fellow alumni that you are safe to contact and/or meet up with; but not necessarily vice-versa since anyone who is not an alumnus/alumna and who happened to view your contact details can send you an email and pretend to be a Parscian.

So if you’re interested to meet a fellow alumnus/alumna but you aren’t sure about his/her identity, there are simple investigative techniques

you probably know already. Contacting faculty members of ParSHS as well as the Outreach Coordinator is also another approach to verify one’s identity.

Finally, once identity has been verified/confirmed and the plan to meet face-to-face has been scheduled, the presumption is both the volunteer and the traveling alumnus/alumna adhere to ParSHSAA’s core values – especially the ones concerning accountability, respect, honesty, and sociability. And everything should turn out alright.

Recruiting Potential Volunteers

Look at the current list of volunteers for the AAOP. If you know of a fellow Parscian who is actually residing abroad but who is not included in the list, you are strongly encouraged to recruit him/her to become a volunteer too, share the experience, joy, and noble task of serving fellow alumni, and fulfill our first strategic goal of staying

connected.

Feel free to send this AAOP Kit to any Parscian alumni abroad; and if he/she wishes to join, advise that all he/she has to do is to send an email to the Outreach Coordinator (i.e. ninosandil@hotmail.com) and provide the basic information shown in the “Getting Started” section of this kit.

Volunteering is one single step towards transforming lives. And the way to transform lives can sometimes be very challenging; but if we always remember to embrace and keep ParSHSAA’s Core Values in heart and mind, there are no challenges we cannot overcome.

Be proud to be a volunteer. Be proud to be of service. Then invite fellow alumni to do the same. And you shall reap a rewarding experience that no tangible benefits can ever surpassed.

Volunteer-to-Volunteer Gimmicks

AAOP volunteers are not just there to help non-volunteer Parscians. Volunteers are also there to be of help and to stay connected with fellow volunteers. If one volunteer in a specific city/state/country/region plans to travel to another city for personal, social, or other purposes, you should be the very first to know there’s a fellow volunteer out there whom you can contact.

Again, just remember that one of the keys to stay connected involves the adherence to one of our

core values – Sociability. As Parscians, more so as volunteers, we are expected to successfully demonstrate sociability. That means the ability to foster friendship and camaraderie among us. Now that we begin to form part

of a community we call “ParSHSAA”, we have every reason to be sociable, introduce ourselves to all Parscians and befriend as many fellow alumni as possible regardless of batch affiliation.

Whether you’re really young or you’re young at heart, let others know that you can be one additional charm in others’ lives if they can add you as their new friend.

Keeping Track of Activities

To keep track of activities in relation to your volunteer service and to get a measurable glimpse of this outreach program, you are requested to kindly take the time to inform the Outreach Coordinator about any exchanges you have had with fellow alumni. You do not have to report in details. Rather, simply let the Outreach Coordinator know that you finally receive one

email and has replied to it accordingly… and that such email exchange can be characterized as a result of the alumnus’/alumna’s awareness of the AAOP. You can be very brief in informing the Outreach Coordinator by email.

Also, if any email exchange later resulted in a face-to-face meeting or even a phone call, it is certainly an additional significant contribution that you and the concerned alumnus/alumna have done in fulfilling our strategic goal of “staying connected”.

Then if you have the passion to write, you can be creative in keeping track of activities by writing a kind of “Travelogue & Tips” feature article.

Any Concerns/Questions

As a final note, should you have any concerns, questions, or further ideas/suggestions in enhancing or expanding our Alumni Abroad Outreach Program, please do not hesitate to email your Outreach Coordinator anytime at ninosandil@hotmail.com. He shall gladly respond to your email accordingly as soon as he reads it.

Your feedbacks/comments are very valuable in the success of our volunteer group.

Thank you.

Kit-001 (December 2007 edition)