Development and Alumni Relations Office (DARO)

    Who we are and how we can help you

     

    What we do?

    DARO (the Development and Alumni Relations Office) serves as a hub for activity and engagement with alumni and philanthropic supporters of Maynooth University.
    The office is responsible for connecting with and serving our 100,000 + alumni around the world through various programmes, events, publications and social media channels, and is responsible for raising philanthropic funds to support the Maynooth University Foundation.  

    After a student is conferred, their data is migrated from the student registry to our database. Our team manages the graduate’s contact details and consent preferences.

    How can we help you?

    DARO is here to support your alumni and development needs. The team includes an Events Officer, Communications Officer, Senior Development Manager, Development Assistant and Data Management Officer that will work with you and your team to engage with your alumni.
    *Please note an Engagement Officer role is vacant within the Office at present.

    Departments, schools and other internal MU teams can select activities from the menu below to address their specific goals and challenges. The number of activities delivered for any team will depend on resources and timelines.

     

    DARO can support you in the following ways:

     

    * Please note: Philanthropic donations to Maynooth University should be processed via the Maynooth University Foundation as the University's preferred vehicle for accepting and processing gifts and adhering to the MU Gift Acceptance Policy. This enables the University to follow philanthropic best practice, including use of funds and recording donations to Maynooth University

    (View the DARO engagement menu pdf here).
     

    DARO request form:

    To raise a request, please fill in this form.
     

    How the process works:

    We need a minimum of 2 weeks’ notice for a standard request (e.g. communication to be sent to alumni), 3 weeks' notice for a more substantial request (e.g. an alumni employment summary and analysis report), and a longer lead time for event support, depending on the ask and capacity of the team within a given period.

    Our Communications Officer will discuss with you the goals of the outreach you'd like to make with your alumni and the best vehicle and timeline for the communication and then work with you on the content. We'll do our best to support your timeline whilst managing other commitments of the Office.   

    Our Development team can provide support for fundraising appeals, including planning, activating and monitoring as well as fund administration and donor relations. Depending on the need, the Development supports vary from short to long-term engagements and should work towards advancing strategic initiatives.

    In line with GDPR guidelines, we cannot share alumni contact details with you, but we can send, for example, an email to your alumni on your behalf. We can also identify notable alumni names (whose information can be found publicly) and anonymised data.

    To ensure that our database is kept  up-to-date, we ask that you let us know outcomes of your engagement with alumni. For example, if you request an event invite to be sent, we ask that the attendee list is shared with us so we can record alumni attendance on our database, or if we send out a survey on your behalf, we ask that DARO also has access to the data submitted. This collaborative approach helps us maintain accurate records, maximising the effectiveness of our communications with alumni.
     

    Alumni Data and GDPR:

    Please note that our Office processes alumni data under the legal basis of “performance of a contract. Failing to uphold GDPR could lead to compliance warnings and substantial fines for the University.

    Any data processing outside DARO’s remit requires freely given consent. You must ensure graduates understand that this is separate from DARO’s data processing. If a graduate unsubscribes from DARO’s mailing list, they are not automatically unsubscribed from another teams’ mailing list, and vice versa. 

    For expert guidance on compliance and alumni email consent, please contact our team first. We have the knowledge and experience to help you achieve your goals efficiently and effectively.

    We look forward to working with you.