Next week, Kristi Overfelt, assistant director of alumni relations said they are hosting the second episode of the Cup of Joe series. Cup of Joe, Overfelt said is a way the Alumni Relations found they could interact with both alumni and students while maintaining a stay-at-home and social distancing guideline.
Kathy Barnard, executive director of the University of Idaho Alumni Association will speak with President C. Scott Green in the next Cup of Joe episode on May 12 at 4 p.m.
We sat down for a Q & A with Overfelt to talk about the series.
Could you tell me a little bit about the Cup of Joe series?
When we started the stay-at-home order, my team decided that we had to do something to engage our alumni. Because normally we go out and about into our communities and socialize and do events with our alumni in their locations, all the way across the country. So, since we couldn’t do that we knew that we had to keep them engaged virtually somehow. And so, we get together—the three of us, and just came up and brainstorm to the whole bunch of list of ideas that we could do virtually, and the Cup of Joe series stemmed from that because we wanted to be able to provide some sort of entertainment and informational.
Who did you bring for the first Cup of Joe? About how many people came?
The one in April was our first one, and it was very, very successful we had about 116 people registered for the event, and it was all on Zoom. It was with Bruce Pitman, we decided that he was the perfect person to be our first one because he is such an icon at the university and he’s so well-loved that we knew our alumni would just relish the opportunity to be able to hear him speak.
And then, are alumni able to like ask questions at this event, or is it more like you set up with a set number of things and then on a kind of like tune in?
I guess it’s both. We do it via Zoom, and so what they do is they log on to Zoom with the link that we provide, then they’re all there watching, and then Kathy Barnard who is the director of alumni relations, asks the interview questions. Basically so we have a set of interview questions that we provide them with and then she asks them those questions and then at the very end everybody’s able to tune in and he can see everybody on the zoom screen. But then at the end, we have about 20 minutes of questions and answers and they just provide their questions in the chatbox and then Kathy will ask them, and he responds with answers. So it’s very interactive.
Who do you have planned to come for the next event?
We have one on the 12th with President Green. And then we have one scheduled with Dan Buffett, he’s a long time professor of music. And he directs all the concert choirs the jazz choirs. He is just a beloved member of the Vandal community and across disciplines, because anybody in any major can take a choir class.
What other events does the alumni office hold—especially now that we should not meet in person?
We’ve done a virtual yoga class with one of our alumni. In April, she did it every Monday evening, and in May she’s going to do every Wednesday morning for sunrise yoga.
We have done a virtual cooking class, we’ve collaborated with Ampersand Oil and Vinegar (Tap House) in downtown Moscow.
Kali Nelson can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @kalinelson6
Nic Wittman
are these zoom meetings being recorded so that if we cannot attend the live zoom we can watch them later