The inCircle network, a social and business networking tool available to Dartmouth alumni and students, recently announced that its services had expanded to include 56 alumni and student organizations from universities around the country.
The network, which was first introduced to Dartmouth in February 2005 by the Office of Alumni Relations, allows members of affiliated institutions to build and maintain personal and professional connections in a secure online community.
Among the organizations and universities now affiliated with inCircle are Wharton Graduate Association, University of Michigan, University of Texas, Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, Delta Delta Delta sorority, Northwestern University and American University.
"We wanted to address a need expressed by young alumni to have a way to network with each other on a daily basis on shared interests, common acquaintances, professions and locations," Director of Alumni Information Resources Jan Bent said.
Companies using inCircle can either post jobs specifically to Dartmouth or to other inCircle networks.
The "relationship-mapping" feature allows Dartmouth job seekers to reach out to their peers who work within a company or who have worked for a com pany for guidance and referrals.
The inCircle platform also includes a searchable groups feature that allows students and alumni to communicate to friends within specific organizations, clubs, classes and interest groups. According to the Office of Alumni Relations, there are currently 115 groups that Dartmouth students and alumni have access to.
InCircle allows members to share secure personal weblogs and gain access to unlimited photo sharing. One feature is the Yahoo! Maps integration, which displays maps of where students and alumni live.
Carleen LeVasseur, public relations coordinator for Affinity Circles, the host of the inCircle network platform, believes InCircle provides a "win-win situation" for both companies and job seekers.
"An organization such as Dartmouth's alumni group can leverage their trusted brand to attract its members to use the network, offering privacy and security as well as interactive, engaging features and services that keep their members coming back," LeVasseur said.
While the Office of Alumni Relations pays an annual cost for the network, the service is provided free to the alumni and student community. As an online recruiting service, inCircle charges employers a minimum of $100 to post job offerings to members from a specific university or group of schools.
Dartmouth's inCircle network has approximately 9,000 consistent daily users registered. Users can request to be "friends" with other members within the Dartmouth community. So far, there have been over 100,000 of these invitations from Dartmouth students to alumni.
According to Bent, young alumni and students represent about 90 percent of those using the networking tool. Housing and job searches are the most utilized features by students and young alumni.
While inCircle's exclusivity creates a more secure community than other social networking tools, campus awareness and network usage are low.
"I don't believe the entire student body is aware that the network exists," Bent said.
When the program was first introduced, the Office of Alumni Relations advertised the inCircle network in Dartmouth's dining facilities and entered those who established 10 friend connections by a specified date in a contest to win an iPod, Bent said.
Publicity for inCircle has since diminished and Career Services now rarely promotes the network to its users.
"Most people I know, including myself, do not use the inCircle network really for anything at all," Erin Arnold '06 said. "Since many of the older alumni aren't in the inCircle network, it hasn't really seemed to catch on," she said.
Christine Cuoco '98 said she uses inCircle occasionally, along with a few other networking sites including Linked In and 85 Broads.
"Because I've been fortunate enough to work and network with quite a few Dartmouth alums since I graduated, I'm always interested in making new connections," Cuoco said.
The Office of Alumni Relations hopes to increase inCircle's use as a social networking tool.
"There will be a big marketing push within the next two weeks to introduce inCircle to the Class of 2010 and to inform others that might not have heard about it before or have forgotten about it," Bent said.
