Associate Director, Lifelong Learning and Travel

About the position

The Yale Alumni Association (YAA) is responsible for university-wide alumni relations programs and for organizing and supporting events, programs, initiatives, and other opportunities to strengthen alumni relationships with Yale. Reporting to the Senior Director for Lifelong Learning and Travel, this position will serve as a member of the team responsible for developing, marketing, and executing educational travel programs for alumni, and will help achieve long-term goals related to generating revenue in support of YAA, lifelong learning, new program development, and assessment. Develop and implement marketing campaigns for maximizing alumni engagement with the YAA's Lifelong Learning and Travel programs which include educational and travel programs taking place online, on-campus, domestically and internationally. Incorporate strategies for new traveler acquisition, including a wide variety of alumni audiences, as well as strategies for maintaining relationships with current and past participants.

Responsibilities

• Forges strong partnerships with vendors to develop travel programs for alumni and friends, overseeing all aspects of programs including itinerary review and development, promotion, program evaluation, and coordination with sharing institutions.
• Cultivates relationships with faculty volunteers, working with them on itinerary enhancement, lecture topics, and connections with alumni in the countries visited.
• Supervises senior administrative assistant and student assistants.
• Trains staff representatives on travel programs and conduct pre- and post- trip briefings with representatives and faculty.
• Maintains the Educational Travel Web site current.
• Attends professional conferences for benchmarking and market research.
• Helps staff alumni activities sponsored by the College reunions and the Assembly, including evening and weekend work as necessary.
• May perform other duties as assigned.
• Supervise sales and marketing for all programs, producing quarterly sales reports and forecasts.
• Synthesize and analyze data from a variety of sources including website traffic, email campaign responses, social media, surveys, etc. to support successful program planning and implementation.
• Evaluate effectiveness of marketing strategies.
• Serve as project manager for special programs such as in-house planned trips, online events and specialized digital marketing campaigns.
• Create and implement website content plans for sales and marketing of all Lifelong Learning and Travel educational programs and special projects.
• Lead on incorporating multi-media technology and digital resources from across the University into program content including digital exhibits from Yale's museums and libraries, films from University archives, and other relevant content.
• Organize all aspects of a small portfolio of in-house travel programs including budgeting, program development, ground agent contracts, faculty relations, participant communications (pre- and post-trip), and logistics.
• Manage a subset of the full portfolio of vendor-based travel programs and other alumni educational programs, including program development, promotion, evaluation, and coordination with internal and/or external stakeholders.
• Monitor registrations relative to program targets.
• Cultivate relationships with program faculty leaders, working with them on program content, lecture topics, and facilitating alumni engagement with their programs.
• Orient faculty and conduct pre- and post- program briefings with faculty and staff representatives.
• Travel up to 4-6 weeks per year to staff travel programs, inspect ships, and/or develop new itineraries.

Requirements

• Bachelor's Degree in a related field.
• Four years of related work experience or equivalent combination of education and experience.

Nice-to-haves

• Academic administration, nonprofit organizations, educational program development, or a related field.
• Event planning and/or group travel planning in higher-education setting.
• Experience with volunteers, especially faculty and alumni.
• Knowledge of the University and its academic programs.