REGION II MEETING

SUNY GENESEO

DECEMBER 15, 2004

 

 

ATTENDANCE

 

Schools:

Colgate Rochester Divinity School:  Gordon Chapman

Genesee Community College:  Joe Bailey

Monroe Community College:  Jerome St. Croix, Mark Schwartz

Roberts Wesleyan College:  Steve Field, Diana Brunson, Kristine Reed, Laura McClelland, Jeff Wright

Rochester Institute of Technology:  Jim Winter

SUNY Brockport:  Nora Bell, Heather Allen, Chris Alonzo

SUNY Geneseo:  Archie Cureton, Andrea Mason

University of Rochester Eastman School of Music:  Mary Ellen Nugent, Gladys G. Torres

University of Rochester Med School:  Margaret Christian, Nancy Janson

University of Rochester:  Andie Mravlja, Joyce Thomas, Jon Heininger

 

Vendors:

AMS:  Shane Rauh

Bank of America:  Darcie Stephens

Citibank:  Debi Mansour

Citizens Bank:  Jean Fura

The College Board:  Scott Lewis

Edamerica:  Holly Zaglaniczny

Fifth Third Bank:  Marc Woolf

HESC:  Ed Gilbert

Key Bank:  Kathleen O’Connell

M&T Bank:  Brian Levy

National Education:  Eddie Viera

Nellie Mae:  Katrina Delgrosso, Abbey Linsner

Nelnet:  Anne Del Plato

Student Loan Xpress:  Anthony Pizzuti

TERI:  Kelley Robinson

Wachovia Education Finance:  Karen Blankenburg

 

 

Thank you once again to SUNY Geneseo for a wonderful location for our annual Region II holiday meeting!

 

Introductions ensued around the room.

 

News:

§          Val Nixon’s father passed away this week.

 

Treasurer’s Report (Nora Bell):

  • Current balance:  $644.49
  • No outstanding bills

 

Membership Report (Katrina Delgrosso):

  • You can make changes to your membership data (address, title, etc.) at www.nysfaaa.org under the “Member Services” area.  You will need your username and password to access this section of the website. 
  • If you forgot your NYSFAAA username and password, you can request that it be e-mailed to you as well (in the same section, “Member Services”).
  • You can also download and print a copy of the directory from this area and also complete a NYSFAAA Volunteer Form if you are interested in volunteering for a committee.

HESC Update (Ed Gilbert):

  • Thank you to those who participated and came to the Administrative Workshop.
  • e-MPN exclusive means that schools have all of their students go online to do their Stafford MPN electronically.  No paper is mailed out.  Instant guarantee, money arrives quicker.  If you would like to sign up, let Ed Gilbert know.
  • Financial Aid training grants—any school that had any FFELP loan volume with HESC in 02-03 is eligible to apply.  Can use it to send staff members to any type of financial aid training or conferences.  Applications are starting to come in.  These range between $1,000 to $10,000.  The application deadline is 1/28/05.  Visit www.hesc.org for more information.
  • New telephone number option if a regional event is being cancelled.  Call 888-NYSHESC and hit “*8”.  That will allow you to access any announcements regarding cancellations due to inclement weather, etc.
  • DocTrac—keeps track of documents schools are sending to HESC.  Should take care of re-faxing from schools.  HESC will e-mail the person who sent the document indicating it was received.  There will also be a tracking number for the document.  Examples of documents requiring special handling include:  NYS residency, income and financial independence documentation.  Special handling documents should be sent by financial aid administrators to:  doctrac@hesc.org or via fax at 518-473-1414 for scanned documents.
  • Loan policy Q&A on the web—www.hesc.org to access this, then click on College Administrators and Lenders Business Center; then scroll down the Transaction Center and select Loan Program Policy Information; click on “Loan Program Policy Questions and Procedures”.  FAQs on policy (e.g. late disbursements).
  • Take a look at HESC’s home page each week since they often put updates on that front page.
  • Empire EFT project—rolling out in April ’05.  Will mirror the way funds are drawn down in the Direct Loan program.  They will get a roster to check off which loans the school would like to receive the next day.

 

Executive Council Update (John Smith):

 

Highlights from the most recent Exec Council meeting included the following:

  • Discussed some old business
  • Exec Council minutes will be posted on a regular basis to the NYSFAAA website.  Notification that these minutes are available will be sent out via the NYSFAAA listserv.
  • Conference bills—most have been paid.
  • Treasury is in good shape.
  • Mileage rate will change in January to 40.5 cents per mile.
  • Membership—revisited issue about the way dues are paid in terms of conference registration.  Membership dues are due July 1st and that won’t change.  You will need to take this into account when planning your budgets on the campus.  Membership dues may not be separate going forward instead of tying it together with the conference.  There is too much confusion around the conference to deal with the membership dues being paid.  Separate notification will be sent to current NYSFAAA members via the listserv to renew by July 1st.  The conference registration will be separate.  The online membership registration is very easy to use online now.  ATAC manages our NYSFAAA website now and they do a great job. 
  • Development Training at Manhattanville College in January.
  • Working to set up an annual training workshop with Jim Briggs (across the state instead of regional).
  • Scholarship committee—silent auction was a huge success.  Made over $2300 at the conference that went towards the NYSFAAA scholarship fund.  Hoping to have it in a more prominent place at next year’s conference instead of secluded this year in a room set back from the traffic.
  • HESC Update was discussed. 
  • GEAR UP money available to NYSFAAA.  First cohort now ready to go to college.  Main idea is that we could use the money to provide training to these high schools to help them guide these GEAR UP cohorts without getting in the school’s way.
  • Next Exec Council meeting in Albany as part of the Education Day at the legislature in February.
  • Upcoming NYSFAAA Conferences:

2005—Windwatch, Long Island

2006—Lake Placid Resort (Holiday Inn), Lake Placid

2007—Sheraton, New York City (Sunday through the middle of the week so people can bring their families and possibly enjoy NYC over the weekend).  Great rate was secured.  No overflow hotel—everyone will fit in the Sheraton. 

2008—Possibly Turning Stone, Syracuse (not definitive yet)

 

Lender Updates:

  • Citibank launched Educational Loan Center.  Installed new origination system in spring and can now offer origination and servicing to other lenders.  For Citibank borrowers, their servicer will still be Citibank.  For other lenders who are clients, the servicer will be Educational Loan Center.  Also, their website has changed.
  • Fifth Third Bank—designated as one of the top philanthropic lenders
  • Edamerica—hired someone else in New York, so Holly will have more time to concentrate on her other regions, such as Region II.  Now in the top 10 lenders nationally.

 

Committee Updates:

  • If you are interested in helping with the Support Staff Workshop Committee, please let Jerome St. Croix know at jstcroix@monroecc.edu .

 

Other Miscellaneous Updates:

  • Executive Council—John Smith’s term is up.  Elections will be in March.
  • Democrat & Chronicle has printed at least 2 articles about financial aid recently.  There were references to a company called College Funding Services who seem to be consulting with families to get more financial aid.  This company charges money for their services.  The articles are misleading and make families feel that they should pay money to get more financial aid.  John Smith, Anne Barton, Tony Olivero and someone else from Sallie Mae met with the newspaper not long before that and explained that there are free resources to find out about financial aid, yet the article came out shortly after that.  It was a biased article.  They charged this family $1200+ and they only ended up with more loan money.  We need to get the word out during high school nights to give families the right information about financial aid and how to retrieve it in a FREE way!
  • Kelley Robinson, Katrina Delgrosso, Scott Atkinson all received Citations of Appreciation at the NYSFAAA Conference this year—congratulations!
  • From Jerome—thank you to everyone who helped with the NYSFAAA conference in Rochester!
  • SUNY Brockport taped “What’s New for 05-06” videoconference and Nora Bell brought the tape to the meeting today.  If you would like to view this, please let her know (nbell@brockport.edu).
  • The attendees today approved the recommendation that Region II reimburse Scott Atkinson who paid on behalf of Region II for a gift for Anne Barton for her NYSFAAA Presidency.  Everyone agreed that we should reimburse Scott for this money ($25).

 

Training:  Business and Dining Etiquette—Linda Blakita, CFE

Very interesting presentation—thank you, Linda!