Alumni

Global Engagement Officer 

Jack Earl is the Trust’s Global Engagement Officer and started the role in January 2024. Jack will work to foster strong relationships with Scholars around the world and to develop and deliver a sector-leading lifelong community engagement programme that supports the scholarship’s mission of improving the lives of others. Jack can be contacted on alumni@gatescambridge.org.

 

Scholars’ Alumni Advisory Committee (SAAC)

Following the GCAA’s strategic review of its mission and purpose, in December 2023 the Gates Cambridge Trust Board of Trustees agreed that the Trust should assume more of the operational responsibility for alumni activity under the guidance of an alumni advisory committee.  To implement this decision, we are now in the process of establishing the Gates Cambridge Scholars’ Alumni Advisory Committee (SAAC), which will serve as a voice for the Gates Cambridge Scholars global alumni community to the Gates Cambridge Trust and its officers. The SAAC will provide strategic advice to the Trust to help maximise the impact of alumni engagement programming. It is expected to be an important sounding board for the Trust to test and refine new initiatives aimed at building a deeper relationship of mutual benefit with alumni Scholars.

There is a regular calendar of networking, professional development, public interest and social events for alumni and alumni can get involved directly by hosting events, promoting the scholarship and serving on the SAAC. All events and opportunities for alumni are sent out in the monthly e-Bulletin. For more information contact alumni@gatescambridge.org.

The Trust has created a profile for every member of our community, and we encourage you to keep this up to date.

Public Directory

The basic data in you profile (your photo, course and College at Cambridge, bio and previous education) powers the public directory. No personal or contact details are included in the public directory and you can also decide whether you wish to be listed (see below). This is how to find members of the community.

Private profile

The Trust has created a fuller, private profile so all members can, if they wish, add and update contact, employment, education information and other details.   This allows the Trust to understand and report on the alumni community and send alumni appropriate information about events and opportunities. This is not currently searchable by members, but the public directory provides an excellent way to find key details about your peers, with which you can undertake the usual Internet search (e.g. google, LinkedIn, publicly available professional profiles, etc.). Our experience is that the majority of members keep their information more up to date on their work, education and professional and social media pages.

Updating your profile

You can log in to your profile using Raven or your Gates Cambridge log in details. If you have forgotten your log in details, you can request a reminder from the login page or by emailing alumni@gatescambridge.org.

We encourage you to update your details when they change – particularly email, location, and employment details.  This will allow the Trust to remain in contact with you and send you appropriate information about events and opportunities.

You are in control of your data

You have full control of all data the Trust holds about you. You can edit what is displayed publicly and your communication preferences via your online profile. The Trust will never share your data. You can find more information on our data protection page

Email

Your profile comes with the ability to use a forwarding email address of username@gatesscholar.org. This is not a comprehensive email system, simply a forwarding function.

If you know your username (e.g. j.bloggs) you can test the forwarding function by sending an email to j.bloggs@gatesscholar.org. If you do not know your username you can either log in to your profile or email alumni@gatescambridge.org.

 

e-Bulletin

You will receive the monthly e-Bulletin from the Trust’s Global Engagement Officer, which lists a range of news, events, and opportunities for alumni to engage with the Gates Cambridge community. Due to the e-Bulletin being sent out as a bulk mailing, it may go to your into your spam folder. To ensure you receive all emails from Gates Cambridge please ensure @gatescambridge.org (the Trust) and @gatescouncil.org (Scholars’ Council) are listed as trusted sites in your email programme – and also check your spam folder for any missing emails. You can unsubscribe from any and all emails at the bottom of the email or via the communications preferences in your online profile. If you have any questions, please email alumni@gatescambridge.org.

Social media

We encourage you to join the private Facebook and LinkedIn groups for Gates Cambridge alumni. Links are available from the monthly e-Bulletin or by emailing alumni@gatescambridge.org.

Organise an event​

Gates Cambridge holds a series of events throughout the year including in-person social gatherings, lectures, and panels to highlight alumni’s work. However, these events are not possible without the support and participation of alumni in communities around the world. In the past, these events have included alumni weekends that combine social and networking events with talks and discussions from experts within and outside the alumni community.

Alumni who are interested in helping to organise an alumni event can reach out to the Global Engagement Officer who will help to coordinate the organisation of such an event.

For more information or inquiries on organising an event, please email alumni@gatescambridge.org.

Outreach

Gates Cambridge aims to attract outstanding applicants from as many parts of the world and from as many backgrounds as possible. Alumni can play an important role in this work. Details of two ways you can help are outlined below.

Applications for the scholarship usually open in early September each year, with the US round deadline usually in mid-October and the deadlines for the International round in early December and early January. You can find more details about the application timeline on our timeline page.

 

Promoting Gates Cambridge to your networks

We encourage alumni to promote the Gates Cambridge opportunity to their networks. This can be through:

• Word of mouth
• Putting up a poster at your institution (see below)
• Posting on social media/other networks

 

Ambassador programme

Alumni can also arrange a presentation/conversation at their local university, alma mater or other local educational institution. These can be virtual or in-person. For in-person events, alumni will usually be living close to the university where they plan to give a presentation.

There is no application process or formal arrangements. Sessions are arranged entirely by individual alumni with the university as the Trust does not have the resource or contacts to arrange such sessions. However, the Trust has created the resources below to support such outreach:

• A PowerPoint presentation (please email alumni@gatescambridge.org for the latest version)
• Posters – we currently have posters in English, Spanish and Portuguese (if you’re able translate into another language email alumni@gatescambridge.org)
• If some limited local transport is needed (e.g. travel from your home to the local university), the Trust may be able to cover this cost. But please email alumni@gatescambridge.org in advance of any expenditure to check as the budget is very limited.

 

If you do give a presentation/talk at a university we kindly ask you to send us details (location, number of attendees, photos if appropriate and any feedback) so we know where outreach has taken place and can report this to our Trustees. Please email Jack at alumni@gatescambridge.org with details after the event, or if you have any questions or suggestions.

The Trust is incredibly grateful to alumni who can help us attract an even greater number of outstanding and diverse candidates to apply for the scholarship.

Send us news

Knowing about the successes and activities of our scholars and alumni is key to showcasing the Gates Cambridge programme to the wider world and to our community. A good stream of news allows us to do this – as well as increasing an individual Scholar’s profile.

Will you or a Scholar you know:

• be a recipient of an award
• publish a book or paper
• take part in a significant international event
• organise a conference or similar event
• set up or play a significant new role in an NGO or other body
• write an op-ed
• about to be receive some media coverage
• or undertake something else we could promote

 

If so, send details to the Trust’s Communications Officer – Mandy Garner.  If you can send details before the event all the better, but if you can only send details post event, please do.

Create content

Creating content through existing Gates Cambridge platforms allows us to help to promote your work and to highlight our incredible scholars and alumni. This can showcase to applicants the type of scholars we select and show the wider world the impact our scholars and alumni are having across the globe. There are many opportunities to create content including, but not limited to the ones listed below:

• Interview for a profile
• Blog for us
• Write an article for The Scholar magazine
• Press releases and media contacts
• Got another idea? Get in touch!

 

Upcoming events

• The Trust is currently working on a programme of events, details of which will be communicated via the e-Bulletin

Past events

• Alumni Weekend 2023, Cambridge, UK & Washington, DC, USA – 2-4 June 2023
• Alumni Brunch, Seattle – 29 January 2022
• Alumni Weekend – 22- 24 July 2022
• Lauren Zeitels Memorial Lecture and Gates Cambridge Alumni Reception – 2 June 2018
• Cambridge Alumni catch up at Novi – 23 March 2018

Logos, PPT etc.

If you wish to use the Gates Cambridge logo or PowerPoint template please email alumni@gatescambridge.org.

Scholars’ Room

As a member of the Gates Cambridge community you can ask for permission to access the Gates Cambridge Scholars’ Room during your visit to Cambridge. Please email alumni@gatescambridge.org in advance of your visit for further details.

For any queries you have that are not answered above, please email alumni@gatescambridge.org.