I am always surprised that a handshake and parchment satisfy most graduates who merrily start life in the real world. Why don't graduates ask, is that all? Here's a list of suggested questions to ask ourselves post-graduation:

• • What does the university offer once we stop attending class?

• • How can our student experience – good, bad, ambivalent – be turned into a positive, lifelong relationship with our alma mater?

• • How does the university offer lifelong support for career, professional, and personal development?

• • How can one graduate influence and seek advantages at their alma mater for mutual benefit?

• • How can our collective alumni capital enable us to address some of the biggest challenges facing our communities and our planet?

• • In what way does our alumni status span other shared experiences in our lives?

These are ambitious questions that require a fresh start to our alma mater relationship. We can forge a life as an engaged, invested alum regardless of how active we were in student clubs, sports teams, or campus parties. Each of us has a unique set of alumni opportunities to uncover. These opportunities are determined by certain practical logistics: the size of our university, the resources our university invests in alumni activities, and even how close we live to our alma mater. It is promising to see the increase in virtual initiatives organized by our alma mater and our alumni network. This gives us even more flexibility to participate. By drawing on our growth mindset, we can set ourselves to learning mode. We can forge new opportunities, knowledge, and skills that fit our circumstances.

Over time, our university experience may feel further and further away from our everyday life. This book shows that, even as the years go by, our relationship with our alma mater can hold relevance in our lives. These relationships are multi-layered, with the flows of people, knowledge, and resources. Drawing on our alumni capital, we might discover exciting opportunities or connections. They might come from an academic department, a groundbreaking research project, an inspiring professor, a new professional development course, student leadership activities, or energetic fellow alumni.