Our current system (Datatel Benefactor) requires us to have a separate record for our Alumni Spouses (that being their only relationship to the College).  We are considering converting these spouses to the REL screen of the alumni record.  Anyone have any opinions?

You will find that there may need to be some exceptions made.  (Alum who are married to other alum, Alum spouses who volunteer, Alum spouses who attend events, etc.) 

So long as the spouse does not need any of the fields, attributes, codes on a full record then many of us only keep them on a relationship of the primary donor (in your case the Alum.)

Others prefer to make all relationships full records - I am not yet in that camp.