Meeting on
1.) Discussion on the SLATE/Budget/Development/Sunshine.
The bottom line is NYSFAAA is not currently considered a
lender.
It does not accept money for student loan purposes.
However, we will need to have a tighter budget and find ways to save money.
SED will be responsible to write the regulations for SLATE;
suggestion made that a “SUMMIT” be held with SED to reach out and assist or
provide guidance from our knowledge base.
SUNY has negotiated that any place their agreement is more restrictive than Slate, Slate will apply.
2.) The Next
Generation - Anna Kopit (Aveda Institute), Tanya Patterson (NYIT), and Chris
Constable (Edamerica)
Reported: Four primary findings of
questionnaire and meeting.
A. Webinars and Podcasts can be used to complement training
B. The website needs to be improved. Need to focus on what we are trying to accomplish. Make it easier to find information.
C. Intermediate Training is important. There should be less lender involvement in the presenting of training.
D. There is a need to mentor members in how to get involved in NYSFAAA.
We need to do a better job of explaining what we do.
3.) President’s Report
--Governance – Completed trademarking of logo and NYSFAAA acronym, as well as, purchase of like name sites. Need to reassert or use of these in 5 years, then every 10 years.
--Elections committee needs to be reconstituted with a representative from each region. Election for President Elect will be held soon. Email has gone out for nominations
--Long Range Plan is in the works
Irv Bodofsky reported for the Long Range Planning Committee.
We hired a consultant to help with this important work. The next step will be
to develop objectives and finish prior to conference. They will be soliciting
feedback from the regions and at the conference. Final report due by January 2008.
Both the Next Generation and the Long Range Planning Committees
shared several common themes. Some examples of outcomes:
NYSFAAA website needs to be redesigned,
Develop new ways to deliver training to NYSFAAA members
Manage and affect change
Communicate effectively in informing and advocating
Encourage supervisors to allow staff be a participate in
NYSFAAA
Unify active and associate members, students & families
Develop strong effective leaders who focus, guide and direct
Increase membership and their participation,
Mentor in how to become involved in NYSFAAA.
Scholarship committee will need to find new ways to
raise money. The Scholarship committee will
not run the Silent Auction at the conference. We need to encourage those
in the regions to donate. Suggestion an
Office Challenge to raise money for NYSFAAA scholarships for students.
Soliciting for donations and nominations for scholarship recipients via website.
Membership
Brenda has resigned as 1st Vice President effective July 1.
She will be relocating to
Professional Ethics Committee
Howard Leslie is a co-chair with Doug Schaefer and Mark Humbert.
--Putting something together for NYSFAAA Conference.
--**There will be another discussion of the statement of principles at the September meeting. I will again be emailing them to the region.
Treasurer’s report.
Budget and Finance: a motion passed to remove “ex-officio”
from the definition of committee members in the P &P manual so that all
regional treasurers are standing members of this committee.
**Regional treasurers need to copy all checks before depositing them.
**Regional treasurer training will be held at the conference.
If a regional treasurer is not attending conference, it is requested that a
designated representative from that region attend.
Reimbursements
** All requests for payments must go through the appropriate committee. Marilyn, per our auditors, needs to receive a paper reimbursement form with a signature, she cannot pay on a fax; include the name of the committee or activity to be expensed.
Expense reports are needed for members, and invoices from non-members.
NYSHESC Liaison Report- Jen Dwire HESC has established
a School Advisory Council. Update on the Default Prevention Grant. New Debt
Management Materials added to the Hess’s student publications. Look for updated
Q & A on their website. HESC was seeking Session Proposals for the HESC
Loan Symposium by June 22.
Professional Development
Novice was well attended and went well; 89 participants, 14 staff.
Going out for a re-bid on the site. - Done routinely very two years.
Tax and some leadership training were held. Additional activities postponed because of Slate.
Membership
NYSFAAA is facing challenging financial times.
For the first time in over 20 years the membership dues will be raised.
Membership will be $50 per year and $20. per additional region.
Communications
Website survey
Many felt it is fair. Biggest Challenge – hard to navigate. Need to improve organization.
Enhancements to the Website will be coming soon. Committee requested funds to implement upgrade release.
Early Awareness Ann Barton reported on
giveaways for the State Fair and continuing to work on outreach. State Fair is self-supporting this year. Going
smoothly.
High School Outreach Committee was
jointly reported by Karen Taylor and Linda Bridgewater.
CGS had a good beginning
Success stories, great help to families that attended. Expect it to grow. The grant continues to support it for the next two years. College Goal Sunday volunteer recruitment will be highlighted at the conference.
CAAN name dropped and efforts will be redirected. The Wall chart will continue on.
Regional reports can be found on the web.
Region 3 Elections
Gina Soliz (
Policy revision on Lender Donations/ Development Campaign,
expectations for fund-raising. Acceptance of Payments and Donations have been
re-worded to allow NYSFAAA to accept checks from schools and to re-assure
schools that NYSFAAA is not considered a lender.
SLATE – SUNY renegotiated their settlement
NYSFAAA – is no longer considered a lender.
For educational loan purposes was added into SLATE. This allows NYSFAAA to accept membership checks and other payments from schools and lenders for membership dues and training purposes, such novice and conference attendance, as well as philanthropic donation, i.e. to the scholarship fund.
New policy statement was written and adapted.
We can accept contributions for Outreach functions, training and scholarships.
Budget
We need to reduce spending. All committees asked to scale back expenses. We have budgeted for less support for some support of training and outreach but have budgeted to go into the reserve.
2007 Conference Budget and changes since prior
approved budget.
This is a very difficult year to determine exactly what funding will look like.
After consideration of the difficulties Executive Council has raised the annual
conference fee to $300 for full conference and
$160 per day for Day trippers.
NYSHESC will most probably be running the Vendor room, with
no proceeds going to NYSFAAA. No silent Auction. WE expect all participants to
comply with Slate.
Presentation of the 2007-2008 Budget. The
Budget was prepared based on the requests from all committees. The Executive
Council went through the Budget line by line. Most areas were reduced..
Executive council will make every attempt to reduce costs of council
meetings. We are budgeting for lower
vendor contributions and using money from the NYSFAAA reserve.
There has not been an increase in membership dues in over 20
years. Executive Council voted to increase membership to $50 for the primary
region and $20 for each additional region. Retired membership will stay the
same. Any deficit must be covered by NYSFAAA’s reserves. All are asked to be
mindful of the uncertainty of revenue and try to minimize expenses. Next year
we should have a clearer picture.
The regions will receive a revenue share of $20 per member for their activities.
IMPORTANT
INFORMATION
Membership
dues have increased for 2007/2008 to $50 for the primary region and an
additional $20 for membership in additional regions.
Retiree’s
dues will stay the same.
The
full Conference fee has increased to $300. Day Trippers will be charged $160
per day.
Interim Activities
April 24, 2007 Exec Council Conference Call - By definition in some settlements and in the proposed Slate Bill NYSFAAA was being considered a lender. Counsel advised that a lobbyist be hired to assist with our efforts after the SLATE bill is passed.
The Call discussed legality of hiring a lobbyist. due to our constitution clause on lobbying. (Article IV, Section 2: “The Association shall not devote more than an insubstantial part of its activities to (a) attempting to influence legislation by propaganda or other means; …”
Counsel’s feedback is that it is an ‘insubstantial’ amount of lobbying time compared to our 39 years in existence.
Unanimously approved hiring a lobbyist for this purpose
Result NYSFAAA will not be considered a lender.
Our website was
temporarily updated to discontinue credit card payments and remove all lender
banner advertisement.
Conf Call May 14.
Adopted the following Policy and web statement
Policy:
NYSFAAA will neither solicit nor accept any money, gifts or compensation from any entity described in S620(8)a (lenders/servicers) and/or S620(8)b (guarantee agencies) of New York State Education Law. The Treasurer and all other members of NYSFAAA will refuse any payment to NYSFAAA of any kind from such entities. If any member accepts such payment on behalf of NYSFAAA in violation of this policy, the Treasurer will immediately return the funds and report the breach of policy to the President and the Executive Council.
Web Statement:
The New York State Financial Aid Administrator’s Association, Inc (NYSFAAA) does not receive any money, gifts or compensation from any “lending institution” as defined in S620(8)a and S620(8)b of New York State Education Law (as passed by the NYS Legislature and signed by Governor Spitzer in May 2007). Hence, NYSFAAA does not meet the definition of “lending institution” as defined in S620(8)c of New York Education Law. Therefore, institutions of higher education in New York and employees of those institutions are not subject to any potential conflicts of interest or legal restrictions under NYS Education Law in their interactions with NYSFAAA.*
* This statement
does not constitute, and should not be construed as, legal advice.
Dave sent an update to the listserve with background for the policy change.
In June the language was revised to limit vender contributions for outreach, training and scholarships.