The 2025 Alumni “season” IN REVIEW!

Oct 22

Here's to another successful Alumni year! Below find a synopsis of our major projects, which had great success thanks to our alumni community!

ADOPT-A-MEMBER

Adopt a Member, is a program gives current members a chance to connect with our Alumni. The Alumni provide support, items that the members need, gifts for Christmas IN JULY and are just someone the members can reach out. This past season we had over three-fourths of the corps sign up to be a part of the program. We had many Alumni sign up to participate, some taking multiple members, but we can always use more help! If you are interested in adopting a member next season, please keep an eye out for information on the program to come out around springtime. Jen Siak chairs this project.

HOMECOMING

Alumni Council Homecoming Committee members planned and executed activities for Homecoming Weekend the last week of June 2025 at the University of Mount Union. Weekend events included an alumni reception in the press box before watching ensemble followed by food and drinks at Buffalo Wild Wings, a family meal at Marlington High School, History Night /History Night Display and lastly a family gathering at The Twisted Olive.
Chris Groves chairs this project.

SOCIAL MEDIA & COMMUNICATION

The year began with a Picture of the Week (POTW), Wednesday Rewinds and Flashback Friday offerings utilzing a central planning calendar. This ran successfully through the start of tour where we suspend during the active season. Email communications in February started with a start of the month targeted email followed two weeks later with a longer form update (and companion Blog piece on the Alumni part of the website). An ongoing challenge to our Social Media reach is the increasing number of platforms and generational pull to different ones. We continue to maintain our Facebook and Instagram platforms with an eye towards where else could be efficient. Jay Wise & Kelli Carlson oversee Social Media & Communications.

LEGACY ARC & PERFORMANCE OPPORTUNITIES

Legacy Arc performed twice during the Bluecoats Homecoming weekend with a full battery, color guard, and horns performing musical selections from 1975, 1990, 1995, 2005, and 2015. Be on the lookout in January for information about participating in Legacy Arc 2026! The pause button has been pushed on any future Alumni Corps Experience as that committee looks to engage in the right activity with the resources available. Bluecoats Alumni Jazz Ensemble (BAJE) is looking to return to virtual performances and local alumni performances hope to return in Winter 2025. Eric Krebs is the project lead for Legacy Arc, Ryan Adamsons for BAJE, Jay Wise for other performance opportunities.

ALUMNI MERCH

In addition to twice a year alumnijacket offerings, we provide alumnian opportunity to purchase alumnigear via a link on the Bluecoats Alumni page online. This year we also put together an Observer Effect t-shirt for alumni to purchase and then with the proceeds, sponsored a full day of meals for the corps during Finals Week. Nancy Johnson chairs this project.

HISTORY NIGHT

The 2025 program ran 90 minutes and was live-streamed on Facebook but unfortunately that live-stream was not recorded and not available for playback. We had a beautiful ‘5’ year anniversary commemoration t-shirt designed and with sponsorships were able to provide all members with a shirt again this year.

Christmas IN JULY

Evergreen in popularity, this year well over 300 packages arrived in Arkansas from Alumni and parents for members of the 2025 Bluecoats! Based on tour, Christmas (in July) came a day early on the 24th. The option for on-line gifts was very popular. Chris Groves oversees the project with Matt Simpson acting as lead Elf on the ground in (notso) chilly Arkansas.

DCI FINALS HANGOUTS

We shifted from Pearl Street Pizza to The District Tap to assist DCI in promoting new business partners with Finals Week in Indianapolis. In comparing the experiences and Alumni Council costs at Pearl Street Pizza and The District Tap, we will continue to investigate establishments for our Finals Day hangout in 2026. Kelli Carlson oversees Finals Hangouts with Nam Chau assisting in Indy.

AGE OUT CROSSOVER

The Crossover Committee is a way of welcome the seasons age outs in to becoming an Alumni. The members are provided a packet with a letter from Mike and Gen, a letter from the Alumni, a flyer to highlight Alumni activities, as well as a Shield charm that can be added to their shoelace to symbolize their time with the Bluecoats. We are going to expand the items we offer in the age out packet to include ways to approach life after tour and mental health. We have all experienced feelings after we have aged out and we wanted to provide items to the members to help navigate life after their last summer with the Bluecoats. Jen Siak chairs this project.

And more!

Jenn Renaud Johnson was asked to assume leadership of Bluecoats Recognition Awards committee and is working to optimize the nomination process.
Led by Kelli Carlson, there were 82 donations towards Member Sponsorships that totaled over $14,000.
Erin Stuart is spearheading a more efficient way to store our physical archives to ensure longevity as we display our History three times each summer at History Night, Innovations IN BRASS VIP suites and DCI Finals Day History Row.

Jay Wise