Message from the President Special points of interest

Your new NCASFAA Board met June 20 to plan for the 2017-18 year.

Fall Conference is scheduled for November 5-8, 2017.

Consider volunteering to help NCASFAA become a better organization to serve you!

It’s time to renew your member-ship for 2017-18!

Inside this issue

Hello my NCASFAA Family! I am so excited to be

serving as your 2017-18 NCASFAA President.

Having been a member of this fantastic associa-

tion for thirteen years, I know the value that

comes from being a part of this group of out-

standing individuals. As this new-year begins, I

hope that we are all doing everything we can to

help every eligible student receive what they need to achieve their goals

and dreams of going to college. Whether it be a 2 or 4-year public, a propri-

etary or a private institution, that is why we are here. To make dreams

come true.

The theme for this year is “A lamp unto their feet, a light unto our path.”

That is what we strive to be every single day. Through our interactions with

each student, we are a shining light leading them to a brighter future. Sad-

ly, our job tends to be a thankless one, but in our hearts we know that we

are making a difference in the lives of these students and their families.

That we are opening a door for them to be successful and achieve what

they may have thought impossible. They can’t do it without our help. We

are also a bright light to each other in this profession. On a daily basis, I see

people using the listserv or just reaching out to other colleagues individual-

ly asking questions, providing guidance and updating us all on the most re-

cent addition to our workloads coming out of Washington. We are helping

each other to be the best Financial Aid Administrators in the country, in my

opinion. From Manteo to Murphy, we are invaluable to the citizens of this

state.

This year there is a wide array of training and opportunities coming your

way. The NCASFAA fall conference will be held at Pinehurst in the magnifi-

Summer 2017 Edition

Message from the President

1 President’s Message Continued

2 Webinars

3 NCASFAA Board Working for

You! 4 NCASFAA Fall Conference

5 Should Financial Literacy be a Financial Aid Office Initiative? 6 Big Ideas for Student Retention

7 Fall Conference Charity; SASFAA

New Aid Officers Experience 8

Renew Your Membership and

Volunteer 9

President’s Message Continued...

cent Carolina Hotel for the very first time ever. Believe me, it is an abso-

lutely gorgeous venue for a conference and I hope to see many of you

there. Rose Mary Stelma is planning a great event for us, so please don’t

miss out. Book your rooms now. The spring conference will be held at

our favorite place, the Holiday Inn Sunspree in Wrightsville Beach, and

Rachel Cavenaugh is working on a fantastic time for us there so don’t

forget to plan for that as well. Kendra Simmons is scheduling webinar

trainings throughout the year and Vice President Sarah Evans has the

Support Staff Trainings well underway for this October. The SASFAA con-

ference will be in Alexandria, VA and the NASFAA Leadership & Legisla-

tive Expo will be in DC in February.

We also have a great opportunity to serve this October. On October

22nd , NCASFAA and CFNC will be partnering to bring financial aid Infor-

mation statewide through UNC-TV. Marcia Weston and Lisa Koretoff had

the idea to utilize UNC-TV to reach those students who have difficulty

getting to a FAFSA Day location or maybe are just anxious about it. They

saw that other states have utilized public television with great success to

reach those students and asked, “Why aren’t we doing that here?” and

an idea was born. UNC-TV has afforded us the opportunity to assist

those students by having financial aid professionals available to take

calls and answer questions students may have about filing a FAFSA just

like a FAFSA Day site. It will be a truly amazing experience so stay tuned

for more info. Lisa Koretoff is working with the Governor’s Office to have

Financial Aid Awareness Week moved to October as well. With the intro-

duction of Prior Prior Year, it was easy to see that a change was needed

and the State and High School Relations committee is leading the charge

in making that happen.

I think there is something for everyone this year and if you can’t find

something let me know and we will see what we can do. This is looking

to be a banner year for NCASFAA and I am so glad to be a part of this

with you.

Jason J Johnson

2017-18 NCASFAA President

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2017-2018 Executive Board

Jason Johnson, President

Jamie Pendergrass, President-Elect

Andrea Simpson, Past President

Sarah Evans, Vice President

Traci Mitchell, Secretary

Karen King, Treasurer

Zilma Lopes, Treasurer-Elect

Rose Mary Stelma, Agencies/Fall Program

Chair

Melody Lawrence, Budget and Finance

RaChele Summers, Diversity/Global Issues

Joel Trogdon, Legislative Advisory

JD Gibbs, Membership

Mary Otto, Prof Advancement

Rachel Cavenaugh, Spring Program Chair

Tyler Cook, Publicity and Publications

Casey Wallen, Site Selection

Lisa Koretoff, State and High School Relations

Cedric Barksdale, Technology Task Force

Nadine Ford, Prof Advancement– Intermedi-

ate

Janee Knippenberg, Professional Affiliates

Kendra Simmons, Prof Advancement– NC

Training Webinars

Remember, training webinars are free to current NCASFAA members. If you are not a member, the cost is $25 which includes the membership and access to all training webinars.

We are thrilled to offer several training webinars this year! These webinars will be presented by NCASFAA’s Platinum-level Professional Affiliates and our colleagues.

September 6, 2017 The first webinar will be offered on September 6. Andrea Simpson (Surry Community College) will provide best prac-tices to help students navigate the FA Puzzle. This interactive webinar will explore creative methods used to help parents apply for and understand financial aid.

November 7, 2017 Federal Regulations/Compliance Concerns Question and Answer Session with David Gelinas. Questions must be pre-submitted by members in order to have them addressed by the presenter. The deadline for submissions is Friday October 20, 2017 and can be submitted to simmonsk@surry.edu.

We have additional trainings that will be offered in 2018. Final details regarding topics and times will be sent on the listserv. If you have specific topics of interest for future training, please let me know. Also, if you are interested in presenting there is a spot for you! Kendra Simmons

simmonsk@surry.edu

(336) 386-3465

Webinar Training Opportunities!

The NCASFAA Board was hard at work during the July 31– Aug. 1 Board meeting Guilford

Technical Community College. Here are some highlights from the meeting.

The 17/18 Board had some final discussions and closed out their year.

The Board discussed the vision for the 2017/18 year.

The new board members had the opportunity to familiarize themselves with their roles

and create goals for their positions.

Planning began for the Fall conference to be held at this Pinehurst in November.

Below are some pictures of your Board working hard to make sure NCASFAA gets off to a great start in 2017-18.

Your 2017-18 NCASFAA Working for You!

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Save the Date! November 5-8, 2017 Fall Conference

New Aid Officers plan to come early! There will be a special pre-conference event just for you. Our Fall Conference charity will be the Ste-ven Brooks Scholarship More on our great charity on page 8! We will be releasing more information on the conference soon, including fun details on the conference ses-sions and activities. Mark your calendars now! You will not want to miss this confer-ence!

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Save the Date! Fall Conference

The Fall Conference dates are November 5-8, 2017. Pinehurst will play host to our event this year. The theme for the conference is “A Lamp Onto Our Feet, A Light Onto Our Path.” We promise to have great sessions and presenters to give you all the financial aid updates and knowledge you’ll need!

Fall 2017 at Pinehurst Pack your golf cart (or car) and drive on down so you can be there when NCASFAA’s Fall 2017 conference “tees” off at noon on Monday, November 6, 2017. Join your favor-ite foursome for a conference that will re-fresh you, entertain you, educate you, and leave you wanting more! You can score a Grand Slam if you partici-pate in one of our pre-conference Pro- Am activities as well as attend the conference! For the pros (otherwise known as experi-enced financial aid administrators) we are offering an R2T4 NASFAA Credential Session. Dana Kelly, from NASFAA, (but her heart is still with NCASFAA) will conduct this session starting on Sunday, November 5 at noon and continuing on Monday morning. Seats are limited to 35 so sign up as soon as you can! For the ams (new financial aid administra-tors with 3 years of experience or less), we are offering our New Aid Officers Workshop. If you are new to the game, you’ll want to follow Mary Otto (Campbell University) and her committee around the course. The New Aid Officers Workshop also starts at noon on Sunday. Our conference will kick off with an ener-

getic keynote speaker, Laura Hamilton. She’ll help us understand that working as a team will help us win the tournament. We’re privileged to have Megan Coval (NASFAA), join us and give us the latest news Washington. If anyone can guess what Betsy DeVos and the Department of Educa-tion might tee up next, it’s Megan! And, even if she isn’t sure what direction they’re headed, she at least knows which hole they’re on. Check the website for information about the round of concurrent sessions we’ll have on Tuesday. You don’t want to miss Wood Ma-son telling you how to avoid “hazards” in COD and the Direct Loan world. Many of your financial aid colleagues will be talking about topics you’ll be interested in, so join us on the green! There are no Mulligans if you miss the Fall 2017 conference! So, score a birdie or an eagle by joining your friends and colleagues. Don’t chunk or slide your shot by staying home. Rose Mary Stelma 2017 Fall Conference Chair

Should Financial Literacy be a Financial Aid Office Initiative? By Lynda McNair, Student Connections

Whenever I’m working with faculty and administrators on student success plans, as soon as I bring up financial literacy, everyone turns to the financial aid office for own-ership, development and delivery. There are many reasons why. Often, we assume that financial literacy efforts are related to default prevention or that only students re-ceiving financial aid need money management education. I would argue that financial literacy efforts need to be a campus-wide initiative and would be better served with their own structure or owned by a cross-functional task force. Here are some reasons why: In July 2016, Fortune Magazine reported results from the National Capability Study

that found nearly two-thirds of Americans can’t pass a basic test of financial litera-cy. This includes information on how to calculate interest payments and basic questions about financial risk. Given this data, you want to make sure that your money management education efforts are available to all students. In fact, you might even want to make sure that financial literacy education is available to all members of the campus community.

COHEAO’s Financial Literacy Awareness White Paper, March 2014, states that “Financial Literacy programs do not necessarily fit exclusively within the mission of any single department or division.” The authors suggest that a wide net of potential stakeholders and advocates will enhance the probability of launching and sustain-ing a program. Representatives from offices such as academic deans and advi-sors; bursars; career services; enrollment management; admissions and first-year experience; alumni relations and development; and financial aid have similar inter-ests in ensuring students develop money management skills. Other departments, such as the library, information technology and institutional research, may be help-ful in providing resources and helping to track participation and outcomes. And don’t forget to include students in your planning efforts!

Anecdotally, higher education administrators repeatedly tell me that information deliv-ered in the classroom carries more weight with students than information from workshops or administration-led efforts. It makes sense that faculty are better equipped to bring innovative pedagogical methods to bear on financial literacy top-ics. Perhaps students take it more seriously if money management education is part of their coursework. Maybe it is related to the ability to apply theoretical con-cepts to real life situations. Do you find this to be true on your campus?

So, while financial aid administrators must be key players in developing and delivering money management education, the odds for a successful effort are greater when that education is developed and delivered by a campus-wide coalition of faculty and ad-ministrators. Each brings a unique perspective to the effort and creates multiple op-portunities to provide students and community members with information that will help

Big ideas for student retention By Shannon Cross, USA Funds

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Here are some questions to ask yourself as you evaluate your institution’s process for assisting students with their college funding: Are you helping applicants complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA)? FAFSA completion has been getting a lot of attention lately as institutions and organizations are looking at closing the opportunity gap for students with limited means. Nationally, only about 40 percent of high school seniors complete the FAFSA versus the 66 percent who go to college. The 2016 Ahead of the Herd FAFSAA Completion Report provides information for each state’s FAFSA completion rate. Rates range from a low of 18.6 percent for Utah to a high of 62.3 percent for Tennessee. In addition, the National College Access

Network (NCAN) reports on FAFSA completion rates for 68 U.S. cities for the high school class of 2015. The aver-age for all 68 cities is 48 percent. Despite the efforts underway such as high school nights and College Goal Sunday events, families need additional assistance in completing their financial aid applications. A recent article in Education Week reports that Where Students Need Financial Aid the Most, Fewer Apply. In the first national study to examine the correlation between a school district’s wealth and its FAFSA application rate, the poorer the school district, the less likely students are to fill out the FAFSA. While some states are ex-ceptions, generally, each 10-percentage-point increase in a district’s poverty rate tends to be accompanied by a three-percentage-point decline in its FAFSA completion rate. This particular report suggests that states not only focus attention on improving the rates, but they should also consider focusing particular effort in high-poverty school districts. Are you tracking FAFSA completion for continuing students? As I’ve travelled around the country talking about this issue, I always ask if anyone is tracking FAFSAA comple-tion rates for continuing students at their institutions. Most of the time, the response is “no.” In Here Today, Gone Tomorrow? Investigating Rates and Patterns of Financial Aid Renewal Among College Freshmen, the authors found that approximately three-fourths of students refile a FAFSA for the following year, while one-quarter do not refile. Further, Pell Grant recipients are more likely to refile (83.3%) and Pell Grant recipients who earn a 3.0 or higher GPA their freshman year refile at 84.5%. What can you do to help students complete the FAFSA? In Financial Aid Mindsets among Low Income Students from October of 2016, NCAN reports that undeserved students are greatly misinformed or completely uninformed as it relates to financial aid for postsecondary educa-tion. Despite all the information available about financial aid, it’s not getting to the students who need it most. The report recommends that institutions provide one-on-one assistance in completing financial aid applications, facilitating the online completion of the FAFSA and requiring students to meet with financial aid staff. These ac-tivities can help drive up FAFSA completion rates for both incoming and returning students.

Students want to get a college degree but they are not confident they’ll be able to afford getting all the way through. The Ruffalo Noel Levitz 2016 Motivation to Complete College Report found that more than 50 percent of first-year students want to talk with someone about getting scholarships and guidance in getting a job during the academic year and summer. Interestingly, only 28 percent want to talk about getting a loan - an unrealistic point of view given the cost of education at most institutions and the limited grant and scholarship aid that may be available to individual students.

Steven E. Brooks Scholarship is NCASFAA’s Fall Conference Charity

SASFAA New Aid Officer Training: Experience from Dr. Steven E. Brooks Professional Development Scholarship Recipient

The SASFAA New Aid Officer Workshop was hands down one of the best experiences of my life. I learned more about financial aid in one week than I was really able to learn in almost a year’s time in the field. Because I was fortunate enough to receive the Steven Brooks Scholarship, my school was able to send two additional staff members to attend the workshop. Our week was full of learning, laughing, comradery and bonding. The aid officers were divided into four different classes. Each of which had their own theme. I was on the blue team, and our class theme was Knights Templar. Throughout the week the classes would partake in different challenges and competitions. One night we played “Minute to Win It”, and this truly taught us the value of working as a team to accomplish the goal at hand. It also taught us that it is okay to embarrass yourself in good company.

Once the day was over, we would continue to bond during the evenings with others who were not on our team. We ate, danced, sang and played spades. We shared our experiences as financial aid advisors, and we even shared bathrooms. While the idea of living in dorm rooms may not be as appealing as staying in a hotel, it gave us the opportunity to form a bond and develop friendships unlike any other. During NAOW, new friendships began to feel like old friendships in just a week’s time. I have made friends in multiple states that I continue to keep in touch with, and I plan to visit during future travels. My words cannot fully convey how thankful and appreciative I am for the experience that was granted to me thanks to

the Steven Brooks Scholarship.

Elena Koutouzos, 2017 Re-cipient of the Dr. Steven E. Brooks Professional Devel-opment Scholarship

NCASFAA has three (3) primary purposes, the first of which is “to develop and strengthen the professional competency of student financial aid administrators employed by North Carolina postsecondary institutions, agencies, and private and com-munity organizations.” Therefore, it was most fitting to honor Steve Brooks, the Executive Director of the North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority (NCSEAA) on his retirement, NCASFAA established the Steven E. Brooks Professional Development Scholarship. We award a new NCASFAA member a scholarship to attend the Southern Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (SASFAA) New Aid Officers Workshop. The SASFAA New Aid Officers Workshop takes place for one week in the summer and focuses on teaching financial aid administrators with less than 5 years of experience the nuts and bolts of the business. The workshop is recognized as one of the best training opportunities available to financial aid administrators. The Brooks Scholarship covers the cost of registration and travel expenses (not to exceed $500.00) for one (1) participant to attend the SASFAA New Aid Officers Workshop. Because this training is so valuable and supports one of NCASFAA’s primary purposes, we’d like to raise enough funds to send two (2) NCASFAA members to the workshop in the summer of 2018. Join your colleagues in supporting this great cause. Check the conference website for more details about how we’ll be raising funds this year.

Have an Idea for an Article?

Contact the Publicity and Publications Chair Tyler Cook t_cook@southwesterncc.edu

www.NCASFAA.com

Www.facebook.com/NCASFAA

August is upon us with a new school year starting which means it is also time for NCASFAA membership renewal. If you have not had time to do so please take the time to renew your membership for the 2017-18 year. Your membership is important to you as you can receive webinar training, con-ferences, receive legislative updates, emails from our favorite fed, David Bart-nicki and the wonderful networking and friendships we can build. As of September 30, 2017, if membership is not renewed you will no longer re-ceive any of the emails sent from NCASFAA. Please take a moment to do this important task. I look forward to seeing every-one in November. J.D. Gibbs 2017-18 Membership Chair

Volunteer to Help NCASFAA Serve You Better!

Time is perhaps our most precious commodity. Once it’s gone, you can’t get it back.

The question you must ask yourself is what do you want to do with that time?

To volunteer is to freely offer your time, energy, and service to benefit an organiza-

tion that you enjoy. We hope that you will commit to being a volunteer for NCASFAA.

NCASFAA is, after all, a completely volunteer organization. It is through the hard

work and dedication of all our volunteers that NCASFAA is able to provide training

and professional development opportunities to its members. Please consider volun-

teering on one of the many committees NCASFAA has to offer. We would love to

have your voice to make NCASFAA serve you better and to become the organization

you wish to see.

If you are interested in volunteering, please visit the NCASFAA homepage at

http://www.ncasfaa.com and, on the right-hand side, click the link to complete the

volunteer form.

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Volunteer to Help NCASFAA Serve You Better!