Alumnae a la Carte Course Enrollment

Proposal

Allow local alumnae to enroll on space available basis in any Mills course for a nominal fee.

Background

A significant number of graduates settle in (or hail from) the Greater Bay area.  "Taking a class" is a frequent "pastime" for many working adults and a not uncommon activity for those who are making a career move (for example, going into something that is unrelated to whatever they majored in at Mills).  Almost all alumnae seem to have very fond memories of the classes they took here.

How It Would Work

After current students register for courses we use an algorithm to determine the space available in various classes and then post these online and notify alumnae in the greater Bay Area.  We do a little research to determine a good price-point (could even be an MBA project).  Say it comes out at $1500.  We would have to develop an low cost billing system so we don't have to spend too much on what would, at first, be a low volume operation.

This might already be possible but we suspect the current price point is prohibitive.  We should price it to be competitive with other options recognizing that we are more or less selling the empty seats on the plane (not entirely since instructors do have to grade the work, etc.).

Benefits

Taking a course at Mills is certainly a way to tighten up the relationship with an alumna.  Current students benefit from networking.  Each alumna who takes a course becomes even more of a walking ambassador for the college.

Challenges

Need to work out the credit/transcript mechanics.  Check out any problems of limiting it to Mills alumnae.  It does add to the parking burden and to be successful there'd probably have to be some sort of reserved spot arrangement because these students would likely not tolerate the long search for a space at mid-day.