October 31st, 2005
if you know the answer is going to be NO, why do you bother asking???
For the last week or so, I’ve been dodging calls from my alma mater. I know that it’s fundraising season and I always hate having to tell the earnest undergrads that (a) I would love to give money but (b) I don’t know if I’ll be able to right now. I really didn’t want to have to tell some fresh-faced kid that I’m a grad student and if any institution is getting my spare change, it will probably be my current one.
So after hitting the cancel button on my phone for the last seven or eight nights, I finally answered tonight, just to get them to stop calling me. And the young man I spoke to was very nice, asking me how I was doing, how I got into law school from being a [blank] major. We talked some about wanting to write (hey, he wants to write also! it’s an epidemic there, though, with all the trees and fog and mountains . . . you can’t help it). It was lovely.
But see, here’s the thing. I mentioned that I was in GRAD school, and so couldn’t make a gift right now. Then HE asked me how I got into LAW. This reminded me that I had updated my directory information, including my new status as a student. And now I’m annoyed!
They KNOW I’m a student right now! They KNOW it and they’ve got their little student volunteers ASKING about how it’s GOING! And yet they still have the nerve to ask me for money???
Look, I’m happy to give, and I try to give every year, even if it’s only $50. Someday, I’d like to do more, because I really do believe in what they are doing. I got so much from my four years there, and I would love to know that I was doing everything I could to contribute to other students’ experience there.
But right now, it’s loan city, baby. So don’t ask me for money. I just don’t have it to give right now.
(Of course, I caved and told them they could call me in the spring, when I’ll probably know what kind of summer job I’ll have. I’m a total sucker.)
comments
The fundraisers are so annoying. I love my undergrad, but I’m in the same boat with you. Plus, once I graduate, I have to start paying down student loans, not donating to my former schools.
I remember when my undergrad first called me regarding a senior gift (back when I was still in undergrad) and I was shocked that they would start off asking for $300 dollars. Now that seems small considering that law school starts off our 3L gift at $2000.
I stand by my theory that Alumni Associations are Scarier than the CIA!
I hate the begging for money. As far as I’m concerned, my family gave my institution a $120,000 gift. For that gift, I obtained a great service, but I simply loathe the notion that I should contribute more to the school other than the significant funds I already disbursed them.
The university provided valuable services for me, for which we amply compensated them (and are paying for the compensation). I get irritated at the idea that it is incumbent upon to me to give them more money.
(Of course, there are many justifications for doing so — I’m just expressing what pisses me off about the whole thing.)
While the whole Rita fiasco was going on in Houston and all the phone lines were tied up like crazy, I noticed that a 512-number had tried getting through to me several times during that weekend (once on Thursday, once on Friday, and once on Saturday). So when it called back on Sunday, when the lines finally freed up, I picked up, thinking maybe it was a friend concerned about how I was doing. It turns out to be the alumni association calling to ask for money.
I’m sure the girl was just trying to do her job, but I told her, if she had called another time, maybe I would have considered donating, and hell no, I don’t have $300 to donate, but since she was too inconsiderate to realize that she was calling a Houston number while the town was going through a meltdown, I really wasn’t in the mood to be nice and deal with her right now.
That was annoying.