Alumnus
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- Old Girl redirects here, for the Australian Rules Football ground, see Victoria Park.
- Alumni redirects here, for the Argentine football team see Alumni Athletic Club.
An alumnus is a person, especially a boy or man, who has attended or is a graduate of an educational institution. The plural is alumni. An alumna is a girl or woman alumnus. The plural is alumnae.
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[edit] Origin
"Alumnus" is derived from the pre-classical Latin present passive participle of alere, "to nourish"; it means a 'nursling' or 'foster child'.
[edit] Usage
The term is often mistakenly thought of as synonymous with "graduate" because it is most commonly used as such, even though it is not literally correct.
Sometimes used in informal settings are the forms alum or alumn as is the gender-neutral plural equivalent alums.<ref>"alum." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1). Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006. 01 Dec. 2006. <Dictionary.com> http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/alum</ref>
Although many coeducational institutions usually use the term "alumni" to refer to graduates of both sexes, those who object to masculine forms in such instances may prefer the phrase alumni and alumnae or the form alumnae/i. This has become the choice of many women's colleges that have started to admit men. <ref>http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/alumni</ref>
Alumni reunions are popular events at many institutions. They are usually organized by alumni associations and are often social occasions for fundraising.
Recently, the definition of "alumni" has expanded to include people who have departed from any kind of organization or program. As such, one can potentially be a "corporate alum" of XYZ Company, or an alum of a military branch, non-profit organization, fraternities and sororities, or training process.
[edit] Related terms
At most public schools and a few universities in the UK, and to a lesser extent in Australia and Canada, the phrases old boy and old girl are traditionally used for former school pupils, and old member for former university students. In Scotland, the term former pupil (FP) is also used, especially when referring to sports teams of a school.
[edit] References
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