Aggie Network: A pandemic project
Picture this: piles and piles of Cafe Rio meant to be serving 100 Aggies being eaten by a handful of members of the Alumni Association. It’s the second day of networking week at Utah State University, March 2020. Everything has just been shut down because of the COVID-19 pandemic, so the alumni are forced to eat cold Cafe Rio.
If I had been in the alumni center, eating cold Cafe Rio instead of helping Aggies learn how to network and make big career moves, I would have just talked to my friends about the world ending and my predictions for our impending doom, but that’s not what they did.
The mentoring director for the Student Alumni Association, Riley Crezee, said for him this was the moment when the Aggie Network project started. After several virtual meetings and lots of research, the Alumni Association produced a game-changing website for students and USU alumni to come together and help each other.
“We like to say it’s a combination between Tinder and LinkedIn,” Crezee said. “The Aggie Network is a networking site that tries to match students with their preferred mentors in their colleges to tell them about their experiences.”
“In today’s society, it’s all about who you know, not necessarily what you know,” the director of alumni engagement, Sian Smith, said, “and we’ve got great alumni that are doing awesome things in the world.”
To get the word out about the Aggie Network, on March 1, the Alumni Association and USU Career Services are hosting a networking event called Aggie2Aggie.
“It’s like a speed networking event, so think about speed dating, take out the dating, insert networking” Smith said.
The event has limited space, but students should receive an email to sign up mid February. In the meantime, students and alumni can sign up to Aggie Network now at https://aggienetwork.usu.edu/.
Nate Lundberg, an alumni engagement officer, said the Aggie Network is not meant to replace Aggie Handshake.
“Now, you can go to one place to network, to find a mentor, to look for a job and to look for an internship,” Lundberg said.
While Aggie Handshake has many job opportunities, Aggie Network provides its users with opportunities to connect with possible mentors.
Aggie Network is a free tool for USU students and alumni. Students can access their account through their A-number and start connecting in minutes.
Emily White is a junior studying English and broadcast journalism. She is currently serving as the senior writer for the Lifestyles section of the Statesman.
—emily.white@usu.edu