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The University of Pennsylvania Alumni Club of Jamaica is official!

It all started some years ago, when our own Marc Goodman, C'92 suggested to Karen Chance C'99, G'08, (Senior Associate Director, Global Alumni Network, University of Pennsylvania) that Jamaica needed an alumni club. When asked for a suggestion for an alumnus or alumna to serve as President, Marc suggested Deika Morrison, ENG'94, W'94, WG'08 — that's me. Earlier this year, Karen called and since I was so deeply honoured to serve the alumni and my alma mater, I readily agreed.

Let me place on the record my sincere gratitude to Marc for his initiative in making this club a reality, and for his personal vote of confidence.

Although the President is chosen by the University, there are no set rules for the rest of the Board. Our growing team of volunteer club officers now includes Kwabena Asiedu, C'08 (Treasurer); Kassim Morrison, ENG'02 (New Alumni Chair); Jennifer Bailey, ENG'95 (Community Service Chair) and Stacy Christian, C'98 (General Counsel). I am delighted to work with the team and welcome serious inquiries for others to serve in any capacity.

The club exists first and foremost for the benefit of University of Pennsylvania alumni who are graduates of any of the undergraduate or graduate degree programs of the University of Pennsylvania and are 1) Jamaican born, 2) "of Jamaican descent" or 3) reside in Jamaica — regardless of heritage. At last count, there were almost 150 of us!

As an official club, the University does also expect us to: 1) Engage in the Global Alumni Network, 2) Promote intellectual, social, cultural activities, and 3) Engage in a substantive community service activity

As such, since we became official, we have been quite busy:

• We have made steady progress in finding our alumni, and updating contact information. However, we are still looking and we need your help to create and maintain a current database.
• We invited all the alumni that we could contact and held our first event in Jamaica — a Welcome Reception for two new students, Asrah Mohammed, C'12 and David Marston, C'12
• We have published our first newsletter (PDF), which is available on this website with the full listing of alumni we have on record, more details about the club objectives, sample officer positions and of course, pictures from the Welcome Reception
• We recognize that our members reside primarily outside of Jamaica, and have taken steps to start a virtual community with this University-hosted website, Google Group (groups.google.com.jm/group/pennjamaica) and a Facebook Group (PENN/JA). Please join! In time, we hope to build a secure login website to facilitate confidential exchange on matters relevant to the membership.

We are a volunteer organization that is financially independent of the University of Pennsylvania. We can do as much or as little as we wish, but I know we will do Jamaica and PENN proud.

Best,
Deika