Help Center: Regional Clubs

For more than a century and a half, Yale alumni have organized regionally based, independent, volunteer-led nonprofit associations around the world. We refer to these groups collectively as Yale clubs, even though many of them don’t have the word “club” in their name — such as Yale in Delaware, the Yale Alumni Association of Louisiana, and many others.

Today, there are more than 120 domestic and 40 international regional clubs that help alumni, parents, and friends connect locally. These organizations are run by volunteers and are legally and financially independent of the university.

The only physical club building in the world is the Yale Club of New York City, which is an incorporated, paid-membership club. Although it has a volunteer board of Yale alumni and works closely with Yale and the YAA, it differs from all other regional Yale clubs in that it’s not a nonprofit association open to everyone in the area. The nonprofit, volunteer-organized regional club for the 16,000+ alumni in the New York metropolitan area and Long Island is the Yale Alumni Association of New York, which brands itself as yale.nyc.

No. Each club is a self-governing group founded by alumni in a specific geographic area,  many of which are registered themselves as official 501(c)3 or 501(c)7 organizations. However, clubs use the Yale name only with the university’s permission, and any applications for creating new clubs must be approved by the YAA Board of Governors. The YAA maintains ties with all of these groups and offers them strategic guidance, database support, subsidized faculty visits, free website hosting, and other services.

If you keep your contact information up to date, you should hear from your local club regularly.

In addition, you can go to this page, enter your home zip code (or country for international), and see which clubs are nearby. Or, you can view a complete listing of Yale Clubs, both domestic and international, here.

Activities vary widely from club to club, but the most popular types are networking socials (e.g., Feb Club, summer picnics, holiday get-togethers); educational events (lectures, field trips, book clubs); community projects (Yale Day of Service, mentoring, other locally organized public-service volunteer opportunities); engagement with local high schools (interviewing students applying to Yale, college fairs, the Yale Book Award); and recreational activities (hikes, family fun days, Yale-Harvard football telecast parties).

Every club also sends two or three delegates to the YAA Assembly and Alumni Fund Convocation, Yale’s annual two-day on-campus workshop for alumni volunteer leaders. Delegates are tasked with bringing questions, concerns and ideas from their fellow local alumni back to Yale, and then returning to their clubs after Assembly and Convocation to report on what they learned.

With more than 120 clubs around the world, each one volunteer-led and self-governing, no two will have the same line-up of events. Some host activities on a weekly basis, while others may organize only one or two events a year. But all have the goal of helping their members connect with each other, with their local communities on Yale’s behalf, and with the university itself. Regional clubs strive to engage local alumni, students, parents and friends in activities that reflect Yale’s core values of education, community, and service.

All Yale alumni in a given club region - along with Yale widows/ers, parents, and current students  automatically belong to that club. 

Some clubs also solicit on voluntary donations or membership dues, and may provide additional benefits to alumni who support the club financially, such as lower admission fees for events.

To ensure you will hear from your local club about events and programs in your area, keep your address and contact information up to date through the Yale Alumni Online Directory, which synchronizes with the university’s central database. Most clubs get updated lists from Yale several times a year.

Yes, regional club activities are open to all Yale alumni — including those of Yale College, the Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and all of Yale’s professional schools — as well as Yale students, parents, widows/widowers, and former post-docs.

Regional Yale clubs in the United States cover territory defined by a group of contiguous zip codes. Just about every US zip code is assigned to a club territory. Outside the United States, clubs are defined either by country (e.g., the Yale Club of Ghana) or by city (e.g., the Yale Club of Shanghai).