Report on attending Cardigan Mountain School’s recruitment and alumni reunion event in Shanghai, China, on August 11-14, 2018

Report on attending Cardigan Mountain School’s recruitment and alumni reunion event in Shanghai, China, on August 11-14, 2018

                                                                                                        by Pornphisud Mongkhonvanit

Cardigan Mountain School

           Cardigan Mountai School, also called Cardigan or CMS, for short, is an all-boys independent boarding school for grades six through nine, located on 62 Alumni Drive, Canaan, New Hampshire, USA. It was founded in 1945 on land provided by Dartmouth College. It is a member of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS), the Junior Boarding Schools Association (JBSA), and the Independent Schools Association of Northern New England (ISANNE). It is accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC).

           Cardigan Mountain School was founded in 1945 by a group of men with a vision for an educational program tailored to the needs of boys in the pre-preparatory school years. The founders were prominent New England educators, businessmen, and civic leaders, including Ernest Martin Hopkins (president of Dartmouth College), William R. Brewster (headmaster of Kimball Union Academy), and Ralph Flanders (a U.S. senator from Vermont). Land for the school's campus had originally been donated to Dartmouth College by the Haffenreffer family. The founders believed the location to be ideal for a boys' school: the land and Haffenreffer mansion, which initially housed classrooms and a dormitory and is now called Clark-Morgan Hall, are situated on a peninsula in Canaan Street Lake with views of Mount Cardigan and the White Mountains to the east and the Green Mountains to the west. The school opened in 1946 with an enrollment of 24 boys, and its growth was fueled by the merger of the Clark School of Hanover, New Hampshire into Cardigan in 1953.

 Cardigan Mountain School’s recruitment and alumni reunion event

        Cardigan Mountain School’s recruitment event in Asia is usually conducted in series of cities in Asia. In the year of 201 there are 4 cities in the visiting series: Seoul, Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. The purpose of recruitment event are 1] distributing information about Cardigan Mountain School to all potential students and their parent. 2] building strong and continuous relationship with alumnus and their parents in the city. 3] getting to know new potential student through method of interview. The event in Shanghai began in the morning of August 13 with team meeting, which include 1] Director of the school 2] Director’s wife (Vice Director of counseling) 3] Director of academic affair 4] Director of counseling and 5] myself as a board of trustee’s member. The event continued with potential student interview, which was conducted separately and individually. At 3 PM, there was an orientation for new students, who have got admit to the school. This orientation was focus on preparation for new students to be fit in to the new school environment. Around 5 PM, the event of  “Cardigan Mountain School’s Alumni Reunion in Shanghai” began, which consist of all Cardigan Mountain School’s staff, Alumnus, current students, new admitted students, potential students, and parents. The event was conducted in formal Chinese dinner style with presentation and shows from new admitted students. All events concluded at 10 PM.

Points of interest and experience analysis

 - Network stcturing 

    The structure of network is rely heavily on current and former parents of Cardigan Mountain School’s students. It is strange that the community of Cardigan Mountain School in Shanghai is in very close knitted fashion. One reason that Alumnus and current students can not influence more in term of recruiting new students, only being a show case of what new student will be, is the age of students, which is around 12-15 years old. Therefore, the network of recruitment have to rely on satisfaction of students’ families members. Considering the status of Cardigan Mountain School as one of the top middle schools in the United State, new students’ families members seem to be willing to involve in all activities that school conducted. Also, they are willing to go the distance in distribute good experiences with the school community and even invite new family to be the part of it. All events in Shanghai was loosely scheduled by the staff of the school but solidly finalized by community of Cardigan Mountain Schools’ parent. So, the process of recruiting new students is largely conducted by parents’ community, and all school’s staff do is giving more confident via solid protocol of orientation and interview process. The process was wrapped up with reunion party, which give more evidence of close knitted relationship among current students and alumnus.

- Impact and result

     The impact of visiting Cardigan Mountain School’s community in their home city, relying on local community itself is rather positive. In one hand, it presented the solid process of recruitment, which reflect the quality of education that Cardigan Mountain School has to offer. It also gave the sense that Cardigan Mountain School did care not only students but also the community as the whole  On the other hand, it shows trust in community that they can do the best for the school. In fact, it is highly likely the best way of conduct since the school’s staff know less on the culture. By relying on the community, the staff of the school have no reason the worry about the culture and how to expand community. They can focus on protocol and how to present the school at its best. Cardigan Mountain School came out of the reunion event with the whole community, old and new, trust and proud. And it can be translate to the success in number of new students.

- How can it be applied to benefit STC

    Comparing with STC, Cardigan’s network in Shanghai is rather weak. It is the third level of relationship for it is not the relationship between school and student, not even between school and alumni, but between school and parent. However with trust and consistency, the result is greatly positive. One point of trust is arranging event in the city far from school. It means the success of event has to be relied on local community. I think the trust has established there. Also the consistency that enhance trust is evident since the reunion event has been arranged every year for three consecutive year. Therefore, the weak structure of network can be enhanced with trust and consistency to establish strong community even through most members of community are third level of relationship to the school, at best.

    STC is also structured to rely on networking. We has a number of students and alumnus in every province of Thailand. However, we has almost zero relationship with all students and alumnus outside Bangkok for we have to rely on agency to communicate with them. Therefore, our relationship with our students and alumnus out side Bangkok is weak for it is not direct communication. We have never have event in local provinces of our students 

and alumnus. We have never asked any help or given any help to them. Thus, we have never established trust with them outside the college. I think STC will benefit greatly if we start to plan to establish network in the way of Cardigan’s. On one point of advantage, our relationship with local is stronger and undeniable since the members of our local community are all our students and alumnus.       They are all in first level of relationship with us. Another point of advantage, many of our current students and alumnus are already the leaders in their local community. We can benefit greatly in expanding our STC’s network.

     Therefore, I propose that STC should plan, with Cardigan’s case in Mind, to establish current students and alumnus by arrange activity or any other event at their local center province with emphasizing trust and consistency, aimed to establish strong STC’s community to be basis of our network for alumnus and recruitment network.

      Since Thailand is confidently divide in to 4 regions and also have 4 capital of each region, STC’s local event should be conducted once a year in each and every region. STC’s reunion should be the theme since we have more than thousands alumnus and current students from each region. If STC can introduce the event of  “STC reunion” with trust and consistency in the heart of relationship with local, current students and alumnus alike.  I think STC can benefit greatly not only in term of strengthening alumni association and recruitment network but also in infinite impacts that strong relationship in nation wide level should provide.