Former students of the Utkal University have decided to work towards putting the brand image of the university with a pool of activities in days to come. On the occasion of the World AIDS Day on Sunday, nearly 100 students of the 1995-97 batch organised an AIDS awareness signature campaign at the university on the sideline of an alumni meet with an intention that the students would carry forward the day’s message.
“This was perhaps for the first time in the university that such an event was organised,” said alumnus Binod Agarwalla, a businessman based in Dhenkanal.
These ex-students have decided to pool in at least good amounts of corpus within a year to have regular activities. A 14-member core committee comprising ex-students staying in and around the capital has been constituted. The committee will approach the heads of all the post-graduation departments of the university with a proposal to create a brand image of the university by the first quarter of 2014.
“We often hear many wrong things about our university; so, we decided we will change the image with our professional experience with branding and regular leadership and alumni talks,” said ex-student Piyush Ranjan Rout, an urban planning management consultant.
Former student Dina Krushna Mishra said, “We will undertake campus beautification work by ‘adopting’ a particular stretch of road in the university premises similar to various international universities that we see in Boston or Harvard or Melbourne.
“Most likely, the road that leads from the entrance to the heart of the university will be the one that would be our priority. However, everything depends on the approval of the university authorities. We will formally approach them in this regard,” said Prakash Tripathy.
University PG Council Chairman Prof Prafulla Mishra, who opened the signature campaign, applauded the efforts of the alumni, committed that the university would extend all its support for such novel work.