Help Center: Alumni Data

Alumni data is vitally important to the university. Alumni Affairs & Development (AA&D) maintains Yale’s official alumni records and keeps track of contact information, education history (both at Yale and other academic institutions), employment and career-related information, communication preferences, philanthropic history, and key points of engagement (both within Yale and outside Yale).

Alumni Affairs & Development has a dedicated unit called Information Management and Donor Services, headed by Senior Director Sondra Cruver. This area oversees the alumni database, called Hopper, as well as data record maintenance and management.

Yale collects alumni data so that we can keep you abreast of news, programs, benefits, events, offerings, and meaningful opportunities in areas that interest you.

For updates to or inquiries about your own record, you can log in to the Online Alumni Directory or you may also contact Gift and Records Services, within the Information Management and Donor Services unit, directly at alumni.records@yale.edu. You are always welcome to contact your liaison in the Yale Alumni Association or Yale Alumni Fund if you are doing volunteer work for them or other areas. All staff across Alumni Affairs & Development work closely together to keep alumni data up to date; no matter who you talk to, you can be assured that you will find an answer to any of your alumni data questions. To ensure the privacy of our constituents, any request to update information on an alum other than yourself requires additional verification and validation before our database is updated.

Yale takes a multi-pronged strategy to maintaining current information on alumni, updating the alumni database through multiple channels and efforts. These include, but are not limited to, the following:

• System Integrations – such as with Banner, Yale’s student information system of record, and direct updates from alumni via the Online Alumni Directory. This also includes integrations with Cross Campus, Yale’s online networking and mentoring community, and GiveCampus, Yale’s volunteer management system.
• Direct Alumni Outreach – Yale collects updates on alumni information through direct outreach via postcards, texts, emails, and phone calls.  
• Address Information – Yale updates address information in a variety of ways, including recording bad addresses through USPS return mail and address changes through USPS’s National Change of Address (NCOA) program.
• Data Append Services – Contact information updates (address, phone, and email) from providers such as Alumni Finder.
• Other – Yale also monitors obituaries for the purpose of updating deceased information, and coordinates with certain offices and schools throughout the university to collect updates on other pieces of alumni information. Yale also receives additional updates to alumni information from University staff liaisons and alumni volunteers.

We care deeply about having the most accurate information possible and strive to maintain that accuracy. From time to time, we are notified of inaccuracies in constituent contact data. Please notify us about contact information updates at alumni.records@yale.edu. You may also self-report and update your information using the Online Alumni Directory.

Your lists are based on up-to-date information in the alumni database. You may find from time to time that you are aware of a change in a classmate’s contact information that Yale is not aware of. We are very grateful for these updates. For other questions regarding clubs, interest groups, or Yale College classes, please contact the Yale Alumni Association staff member associated with the club, group, or class.

All alumni have the option of logging into their Online Alumni Directory account and updating their communication preferences. We allow as much flexibility as possible in terms of opting in and out of various communications. Yale maintains guidelines to be in accordance with privacy and regulatory standards, and we periodically review records to ensure that alumni are receiving the communications they desire.

The Online Alumni Directory is Yale’s one-stop shop for alumni information, regardless of school or affiliation – although some schools, like the School of Management, maintain their own directories. The Alumni Directory contains a live data exchange with Hopper, Yale’s alumni database, so that updates made in the directory are made in the database and vice-versa. The purpose of this exchange is to give alumni the most accurate and up-to-date information about fellow classmates. 

The Alumni Directory contains academic background information, as well as contact information on Yale alumni including post-doctoral fellows and international affiliates. By accessing your profile through the directory, you can also view your own giving history, open pledges, as well as take advantage of other online resources offered by Yale.

The Alumni Directory is the primary source for updates on alumni information. There are more than 10,000 updates made in the directory annually. When an update is made in the directory, the information is then updated in Hopper and other applications such as Cross Campus and Give Campus through those systems’ integrations with the directory.

Yale follows all statutory and compliance processes with regard to protecting privacy of alumni information, conducts regular reviews with Information Security at Yale, and closely monitors changes in the regulatory and compliance environment with other senior university administrators. All new software requires security design reviews and due diligence is given with a strong emphasis on protecting the privacy of alumni data.

The Alumni Directory is a part of the Yale network. It is login and password protected and available only to registered users. The directory is subject to the Minimum Security Standards (MSS) defined by Yale Information Security. Each user also has the option of suppressing any information that you do not wish to appear in the directory. That is, users may hide particular information fields in their listing to prevent those fields from being viewed by other users.

If alumni have questions regarding privacy, please refer them to the AA&D Personal Information Disclosure and the Yale Online Alumni Community Terms of Use, which includes Yale’s Privacy Policy and the Yale Online Alumni Community and YaleMail Privacy Policy. If you would like further guidance on a particular matter, please contact Sondra Cruver, Senior Director, Information Management and Donor Services, or Jenny Chavira, Deputy Executive Director, Yale Alumni Association.