5.0
MASFAA EXECUTIVE
COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES
January 21-22, 2006
Dick Battig *Jack
Lyons
Debbie Scholz
John Beneke Dan
Mann Steve Schuetz
*Elaine
*Angie Comstock *Ernesto Monge Rick Shipman
Vickie Crupper
Lois
Mulbrook Mary Jo Smith
Kim Donat Richard Nash Howard Thomas
Arman Habegger Al Pinckney Jason VanSickle
Billie Jo
Hamilton John
Pogue Jerry Wade
Zina
Haywood Samantha Ruffini Claudia Wenzel
Brian Heinemann *Janet
Ruge Cari
Roberta Johnson Wendell
Schick Christal
Williams
Karen Kopp Michiale
Schneider
*absent
ACTIONS:
Motion: to approve our 2005-2006 discretionary
committees and Committee Chairs. Pogue/Schick.
Motion carried.
Motion: to
accept the proposal for a $300 symposium flat fee as presented by the committee. Pogue/Nash.
Motion carried.
Motion: to change the P & P to include the
Treasurer and Newsletter to be part of the WEB Services Committee. Nash/Heinemann
Adjusted Motion:
to change the P & P to include the Treasurer Elect, Newsletter Chair
and Summer Institute Chair to be part of the WEB Services Committee. Nash/Heinemann. Motion carried.
Motion: to approve the waiving of the conference fee
for the Treasurer Elect. Pogue/Sellers. Motion carried.
Motion: to accept the Corporate Support committee
recommendations to:
Motion: to accept the minutes for the 0405 Executive
Committee, dated October 15, 2005.
Heinemnan/Pinckney Motion
carried.
Motion: to accept the minutes for the 0506 Executive
Committee, dated October 26, 2005
Pogue/Heinemann. Adjustment to include Summer Institute as written report. Motion carried.
Motion: to
approve the concept of the award and to have the awards committee bring
modifications to the Association Governance Committee. Hamilton/Shipman. Motion carried.
Motion: to
adjourn. Pinckney/Heinemann. Motion carried.
President: Dan
Mann
President Dan Mann called the
meeting to order at 8:37am. Welcome to
Janet Dodson from NASFAA and Brent Tener from SASFAA. Congratulations to Zina Haywood as she was
promoted to Executive Vice President/Provost of her College. Introductions were made to our guests. Jack Lyons is better and is back to the
office, but will not be able to make it this weekend. Housekeeping update by Dick Battig. We will be eating in the hotel this
evening. State presidents are
recommended to sit at the lunch table together to have their meeting. Dan had wanted to have some students come in
for a focus group before lunch, however, it didn’t work out, but we will try
again in
See written report. MASFAA has sent the $3000 stipend to
NASFAA’s National Forum on
Educational Loans will be addressing the costs and long term financing for an
education. 140 national members were
invited to the forum in
Motion: to approve our 2005-2006 discretionary
committees and Committee Chairs. Pogue/Schick.
Motion carried.
Ernesto Monge has resigned as
the Research Chair and Dan is working on getting a new chair for this
committee.
Conference Program:
Roberta Johnson
The program committee met on
Wednesday – Friday, prior to this exec committee. Roberta is very pleased with the committee
members. There were many ideas to carry
on the theme of “It’s about students.”
The conference theme will be about education, i.e. the evaluations will
be like report cards. There was
discussion during the program meeting that the states would like to have their
state meetings earlier to get more participation. Roberta would like to open up for discussion
on whether we should have state meetings or sector meetings. Discussion ensued regarding having state
meetings more than having sector meetings.
If we move the state meetings to Sunday afternoon, would there still be
more participation? Roberta will take
the discussion back to her committee. If
reauthorization does go through the program committee will partner with the
federal issues committee to get the information out to the membership. They also will try to have two presentations
by Jeff Baker to go over any and all changes.
If the state meetings are held earlier in the conference, state members
would then know who is at the conference and be able to meet up at a later
date. Dan stated that the program
committee has a lot of ideas and if anyone has any suggestions for general session
speakers, please let Roberta know.
Local Arrangements:
Debbie Scholz
Project development requests
have not yet been approved by the Finance committee, but would like clarification
regarding liability and other details.
Site Selection:
Dick Battig
See written report. The 2008 Conference will be held here in
NASFAA Update:
Janet Dodson
Janet started in aid at
NASFAA is looking good; the
Finance Committee has met regarding the tier approach. The auditors suggested that they include the
Finance Audit and are now called the Finance and Audit Committee. There are cities that can and cannot hold a
NASFAA Conference. NASFAA is trying to
be very sensitive to regions but not all regions can hold a conference, so regions
may be sharing a conference.
Nominations and elections are
coming up. Superbowl weekend is the
weekend that the ballot is developed.
NASFAA is really looking at regional representation. The Leadership Conference is coming up and
there are a number of members from MASFAA that are on the Leadership Conference
Committee.
The upcoming Conference is in
Janet really encouraged
volunteerism and representation from the MASFAA region. We can make a difference in our profession
and opportunities are always available.
Don’t make things too easy for students, but reasonable and
understandable.
There will be representation
at the
We need to make the
opportunities for students to get an education.
The Washington DC Conference
is around July 17, 2007.
Diversity is a challenge for
the NASFAA board. Whether it is an age
issue or race issue is getting harder to find individuals that are staying in
education vs. higher incomes in private sectors. So the issue with NASFAA is the same with
most non-profit organizations and higher education in general. Janet is looking for individuals that are
willing to work and generate magic.
SASFAA Update:
Brent Tener
Brent extended greetings from
SASFAA. Brent also got his start in the
MASFAA region and his first conference was here in
President-Elect:
Vickie Crupper
See written report. Theme is developed and there will be a
pre-conference workshop. Vickie’s
conference will be the 45th anniversary. She also needs to finalize some state
exchange events. Rick Shipman stated
that NASFAA has all the dates for College Goal Sunday, (CGS), but Vickie would
like to have the links for the individual states’ information. However, Rick stated that NASFAA links to the
individual state links.
Symposium Committee:
Zina Haywood
RMASFAA has decided to not
participate as a partner for this event.
See written report. Steve Morgan
will lead the general session on renewing your spirit. Zina asked if we should invite RMASFAA. The title is “Putting the Pro Back in
Professional.” The target is to have
75-100 attendees. We need to make sure
that we have a quality symposium with good content and an ultimate product come
from the symposium. The committee has
set up the fee structure similar to Summer Institute. $300 Symposium fee to cover two nights
lodging and one lunch and breakfast.
RMASFAA could not commit to the $15,000 as MASFAA was doing, due to
their financial situation. A priority
date for MASFAA was suggested and then open the symposium up to other Financial
Aid professionals. The intent of the
symposium is to provide a benefit to the membership with a nominal fee for a
commitment to the membership. Would membership
fees be extra if someone is not currently a member of MASFAA? If not a member the fee would be $300 plus
the current membership dues. Suggestion
was made that if we invite RMASFAA members, they would not have to pay the
fees. Motion: to accept the proposal for a $300 symposium flat
fee as presented by the committee.
Pogue/Nash. Discussion ensued
on whether there should be a commuter fee established, but is the theme that
and intent might be as a retreat type of function. Motion
carried. Attendees must belong to an
association after the
State Exchange:
Vickie Crupper
To date there is only one
state requesting reimbursement request.
Past-President:
Howard Thomas
Howard attended the NASFAA
Board in
Association Governance: Howard Thomas
See written report. By Law change has been sent to ATAC to put on
the website. There was a 97% vote for
the change in definition and fees for retired members. The committee might be bringing in an outside
facilitator to assist with long range planning.
Motion: to change the P & P
to include the Treasurer and Newsletter to be part of the WEB Services
Committee. Nash/Heinemann Discussion ensued regarding why this is
important based on how much information is put on the website by these two
positions Motion: to change the P & P
to include the Treasurer Elect, Newsletter Chair and Summer Institute Chair to
be part of the WEB Services Committee.
Nash/Heinemann Discussion ensued regarding who participates
on the committees and the amount of users of the website be included in the
committee. The information that goes on
the web should go through the web services committee chair and then they could
possibly contact ATAC at that point. The
intent of AGP was to show that the web committee is more than just one person,
but should include other individuals. Motion carried.
Nominations and Elections: Howard Thomas
Conference Call is being used
to follow the calendar. January 31st
is the next conference call to make up the slate for the upcoming
election. A ballot will be sent in April
to ATAC to get posted to the website.
Vice President:
Billie Jo Hamilton
See written report. The insurance costs will be for the same
amount of funding, however, the coverage will be expanded. Billie Jo will bring more information back to
the exec council, once she has it. The RFP
is being investigated for tax preparation and audit. We have had some IRS issues, so it would
still be a good idea to have a firm handle the tax preparation.
See written report on Finance
Committee. The registration fee for the
treasurer elect for the conference will be waived, considering all the work
that is done for the conference. It may
also encourage individuals to run for the position of Treasurer.
Billie Jo discussed the
process for the CDs that MASFAA currently has.
She will being going back to the original financing idea to get MASFAA back
on track with a three month cycle for the CDs.
Maturity dates and interest rates may be better, since we don’t have any
CDs at this time.
Billie Jo is going to put
together a draft on what can be considered for reimbursement for MASFAA members
that submit travel.
Motion: to approve the waiving of the conference fee
for the Treasurer Elect. Pogue/Sellers Motion carried.
There are still three
individuals that have not paid for the conference. Samantha Ruffini is in contact with those
individuals.
Corporate Support:
Jason VanSickle
See written report. Levels of support were brought up for the
amount of funding provided based on what they are getting. Platinum, Gold, Silver and bronze. Sponsorships are getting more concerned
that they are getting enough benefits for their sponsorship dollars. Some of the vendors are asking for the
registration fees to be waived for all levels, except exhibitors only. Jason discussed web sponsorship availability. Corporate support will be sent through
email from Jason to all possible vendors.
He hopes to make that deadline earlier to get organized and ready for
the conference. Jason really would like
his committee to develop a new corporate support structure.
Platinum level – get all the
levels from Jason for the minutes.
Acknowledgement of the sponsorship
is very important and the committee would like to see the recognition of such
during all the events. At the recent
conference there were concerns that some of the sponsors weren’t recognized on
the PowerPoint. Dan had recently sent an
email to the membership to give more recognition to the sponsors. Discussion ensued regarding the points and
issues that Jason brought to the table.
Downloading of the participant list is possible and Howard stated that
he could assist someone from Jason’s committee to generate the lists. Motion:
to accept the committee recommendations to:
Secretary:
Karen Kopp
Motion: to accept the minutes for the 0405 Executive
Committee, dated October 15, 2005. Heinemann/Pinckney Motion carried.
Motion: to accept the minutes for the 0506 Executive
Committee, dated October 26, 2005
Pogue/Heinemann. Jerry Wade will resubmit report
as it was not included in the original minutes.
Motion carried.
Treasurer: Samantha
Ruffini
See written report. Samantha has worked to get the elected
officers official with the bank services, so everyone is now legal. Samantha discussed record retention and Rick
Shipman stated that he will look into helping Samantha with this volume of
paperwork.
Samantha has handed out to
the Exec committee the profit/loss statement, the balance sheet and other
documents. Income for this time of year
is virtually nothing, so it looks different due to conference expenses. Money Market was reviewed and shows the
current balance. The profit/loss was
compared between the two most recent years, as of November 1st,
which is the beginning of the fiscal year.
The differences are due to late paying conference attendees from the
The current expense form has
the mileage rate of 40.5 cents. Items
that are covered were reviewed and the timing of payment was also brought up.
Billie Jo brought up that
reimbursement of internet costs for executive council committee members is not
reimbursable. Many hotels do include
internet access as part of the contract for conferences. Discussion ensued with regard that members
are giving up their weekends and possible consideration for this fact. MASFAA does not pay for personal phone
calls. Dan suggested that the issue be
taken back to Finance Committee for suggestions or other proposals.
Treasurer-Elect:
Brian Heinemann
No written report.
Delegate at Large:
Rick Shipman
No written report. Rick has contacted the three committee chairs
Archives Committee:
Arman Habegger
Materials that were provided
by Marc Brenner were supplied, with a number of pictures. There is now a link from the MASFAA website
to the archives website. Arman will be
originating the request at the next meeting for the payment of the $500 for the
archives.
Research Committee:
Rick Shipman recently attended the College
Scholarship Service. He said that a
project that was discussed was the loan indebtedness in conjunction with the
income levels of our students.
The research committee is
complete in terms of membership and they are looking for an instrument to have
the training survey. They also may be
charged with research on long range planning.
Web Services:
Mark Martin
Mark believes that Brian
Heinemann’s support will be very helpful.
Mark has been able to pass on information to Paula from ATAC very
quickly. Recommendation for a privacy
policy might be a very good idea. Time
tables, as was discussed by Jason stated how important this issue is. August 1st is the deadline for requests for banner
ads to the website. October 1st
will then be the payment deadline for these advertisements. See written report. Mark discussed how to post reports and
minutes on the web. He stated that if
you have any problems to please give him a call. Mark reviewed what can be done on the
website. Dan stated that one of our
goals is to use the website more. All
members are charged with working with the website.
A suggestion was made to have
all reports put on the web for the next meeting and have a projector and have
the meeting electronically. Discussion
ensued regarding this idea. We are
trying to use the ATAC technology, since we are paying for the benefits. Dan charged Dick and Mark to see if there are
possibilities with the hotels that are used.
Dan charged Mark with contacting Howard and Association Governance with
the privacy statement. Dan also stated
that the deadlines that Mark is using do not align with the fiscal year and
asked if that would present any problems or issues. Discussion ensued with regard to the timing
of the ads and timing of conference registration. Most conference registration occurs during
August/September. Program Committee had
discussed opening the date for Conference registration to an earlier date to
help some schools that might have left over budgets.
Delegate at Large:
Wendell Schick
No written report.
Associate Member:
Elaine
Elaine not in
attendance. Wendell presented her
written report.
Membership Database:
Christal Williams
See written report.
Dan asked if Christal could
report out with a comparison from year to year.
She will also be following up with Membership Services for the non
members.
Membership Services:
Mary Jo Smith
Since the letter has been
sent to the retired members, there is hope that the retired membership would
increase. Mary Jo asked if she should
contact Mark to put information out on the web and he requested that he at
least be cc’d. Mary Jo does have the new
membership brochure available to give to the state presidents for
distribution. Mary Jo created a postcard
and handed them out and asked whether or not it would serve a purpose to
promote membership. Dan asked if there
is a strategy between using the brochure and the postcard. Mary Jo stated that she sends the brochure to
the retired members because she wasn’t sure of their internet
accessibility. The postcard could be
mailed or handed out at state conferences.
If mailed by the state or Member Services, Mary Jo stated that if the
presidents provide the lists, she could mail out the postcards. Janet Dodson stated that it is a great piece,
but perhaps the postcard should have the dates.
Janet also suggested that Mary Jo might want to consider creating a
postcard that would list all the important dates for the year. Mary Jo will add Summer Institute and the
Symposium to the postcard that she has already created.
Delegate at Large:
Al Pinckney
No written report. Al is going to try to be at the symposium and
then substitute for Zina as a faculty member at the Summer Institute.
Question surfaced with regard
to the purchase of CORE materials. The
states will purchase the materials with reimbursement from MASFAA.
Family Education Concerns:
The committee still needs
someone from the
Professional Development: Cari Wickliffe
The committee has a number of
scholarship winners and these individuals really want to help. The newcomers’ breakfast at the conference
worked well, because the tables were already established by state, and the
members had a place to go. Pre
conference ideas were discussed by the PD committee with suggestions being
brought forth to the Exec committee.
The PD committee discussed
having a checklist for first time attendees.
Scholarships were discussed
and the timing of them. Sharing best
practices via the web was also discussed, but how would it be monitored? Customer service, specifically for students,
was brought up with ideas for specific training with these types of situations,
perhaps in role playing. Cari stated
that perhaps they could have a traveling road show of train the trainers, to
assist with support staff training. Cari
suggested that to get in the theme of the conference program as working at
schools. Roberta stated that the program
is going to do at least one session on customer service. Dan asked what the thoughts were on having a
pre-conference. Discussion ensued with
regard to having a preconference. If the
Summer Institute and Symposium are first choice, would it be necessary to have
a pre-conference. There will be a
pre-conference for the 2007 conference, but Dan stated, based on discussion,
that we won’t have a pre-conference for the
Summer Institute:
Jerry Wade
Al read Jerry’s report for
Summer Institute as he had to leave the meeting. Al showed the post card for Summer Institute. See written report.
Delegate at Large:
Colby Sellers
No written report.
All three committee chairs
have been doing a great job.
Awards: Lois
Mulbrook
12 people fell beyond the
35yr service time frame. Discussion
ensued that if the person is a current member, than the award should be
given. Lois asked the state delegates of
what is the best way to disseminate the award information to the various
states. Lois asked the state delegates
to contact her with their ideas for their individual states.
Lois presented the new MASFAA
Leadership Award. The Association
Governance did review this proposal and feel that this is a great way to get
MASFAA out to the states. This award
will mirror the NASFAA Leadership award.
The award will be announced at the MASFAA Conference with a presentation
at the States’ Conference. The award
will be a combination of state and regional service. Discussion ensued regarding the award and
whether it is feasible to get nominations from the states each year. It was also discussed that there are
individuals that contribute to the association that aren’t financial aid
personnel. The intent is to look every
year, but it doesn’t necessarily have to happen each and every year. Recognition is important, particularly positive
recognition. It may also be a positive
influence for the younger professionals in financial aid. This is a MASFAA award through the states for
nominations. Motion: to approve the concept
of the award and to have the awards committee bring modifications to the
Association Governance Committee.
Hamilton/Shipman Discussion
ensued with regard to the fact that this is a
Federal Issues:
Bruce Foote
Bruce stated that he has
seven states represented; however, he would like to have members from all the
states. See written report. NASFAA made a call for action on
Thursday. Bruce is encouraging all the
states to move on these very important issues.
Dan stated that he has gotten nothing but positive responses on the
information that Bruce is pushing out electronically to the membership.
Newsletter:
Michiale Schneider
Newsletter is out on the
web. The next newsletter is coming up
and if anyone has any information that they want posted to please pass it on to
Michiale. The deadline date for the next
edition is the end of February for a March publication. Items can be sent in any type of format. Dan is very interested in comments about this
new newsletter, both good and bad.
STATE REPORTS:
Not in attendance. Colby Sellers presented the
At their most recent
conference, they brought back as many previous state presidents as
possible. There is a picture of them in
Richard’s written report. Fifteen of the
past presidents are still very active.
See written report
Not in attendance. Dan stated that Angie had submitted a report
but Dan would provide one to the Secretary.
Samantha and Cari gave a brief update on what was happening in the state
with regard to the controversial state grant situation.
The Department of Education
came to the Winter Conference to present issues regarding default
prevention.
Not in attendance. Jason gave an update. Spring Conference is also scheduled. February is Financial Aid Awareness
Month. He gave examples of various
events to take place during that month.
No written report. There was a high school counselor workshop
held in October.
Other:
Dan gave upcoming important
dates to the Exec Committee. Please make
travel arrangements for the April meeting in
Dan asked if anyone had any
suggestions for entertainment in
NEW BUSINESS:
Dan asked if the membership
would like to send someone to the NASFAA Forum and whether MASFAA would have a
role in this program. Arman asked who
was already planning on attending, and perhaps present back to the membership
what the outcome was. Dan also asked if
there is anyone that was invited and are not planning on going. Howard stated that he wasn’t going, not due
to finances but that the resources can be used for other programs. Karen stated that she was unsure of what the
forum originally was and that Rick would resend the invitation to her, so she
can contact her institution. Billie Jo
stated that promotion could be better and NASFAA needs to contact more
individuals. Next step would be reported
back to the committee.
On behalf of Zina and the
Symposium, Dick suggested that the members encourage their state colleagues to
attend the Symposium in June.
Dan stated that if you have
any nominations for the NASFAA Leadership Award to please submit the
nomination.
Dan encouraged the committee
members to run for MASFAA offices in the upcoming election. Howard Thomas will be putting the slate
together.
Dan asked that any articles
for the Newsletter need to be sent to Michiale by the end of February at the
latest.
OLD BUSINESS:
Vickie gave an update on the
“pick” of dates of when reauthorization will actually occur.
Motion: to
adjourn. Pinckney/Heinemann. Motion carried.