——–A Message from AACRAO President Betty Huff

Dear Colleagues:

The debate over federal funding of higher education has started in earnest in Washington, and H.R. 1, the bill to fund the government through the rest of this fiscal year, was on the House floor today. A vigorous and important national debate about the federal budget, the size of the deficit, and the budgetary priorities has begun, and I believe that the outcome will affect every one of our institutions and the entire AACRAO membership, especially as it affects financial aid. Beyond budgetary issues, there are indications that other policy discussions of concern to the AACRAO membership, including possibly controversial changes to FERPA, are under consideration.

As you may recall, we recently created a new AACRAO Public Policy Advisory Committee, chaired by William F. DeWolf of Emerson College, to provide the Board with policy recommendations on our advocacy efforts. The Committee has taken an active role in monitoring policy developments and will have its first formal meeting at the upcoming AACRAO Annual Meeting in Seattle.

For the Committee’s work to be successful, and for AACRAO to be effective in advancing member interests in Washington, we need to engage more of our interested members in a conversation about federal issues. To this end, AACRAO has set up an electronic email list for voting members at http://subscribe.aacrao.org/advocacy/. I invite those of you who would like to receive more detailed information and news about policy and political developments affecting higher education to visit the subscription page and sign up to receive updates through email. Our goal in setting up this list is to provide timely updates on the issues and enable an association-wide conversation about federal education activities as they are being debated by the policy community. To prevent the list from overburdening anyone’s inbox, we have set it up as a moderated list so as to keep the number of messages to a minimum. I’m sure we will find ways of improving it as we receive feedback from subscribers.

As always, I am interested in hearing your views about this or any other AACRAO activity, and look forward to seeing you in Seattle at the Annual Meeting.

Betty Huff
AACRAO President

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I am very pleased to be able to serve NACRAO as president for 2011 and I wanted to take a moment to share with the membership some of the items the Board is working on this year.  We started the year off with a very productive annual retreat at Mahoney State Park. We addressed old business from last year and started working on, what we think will be some fantastic opportunities for NACRAO growth this year (more on that later).  I would appreciate hearing any ideas, thoughts, and/or concerns you might have for our organization as well.  My email address is mschill@creighton.edu or you can always call me direct at 402.280.4022.

Also, a couple quick notes:

1. I hope some of you will be able to attend AACRAO 2011 in Seattle, Washington. It is scheduled for March 13-16, 2011 at the Washington State Convention Center and the theme is “Defining the Vision for the Next 100 Years.” Early registration ends today (January 28/ $495) and, as many of you that have attended AACRAO before can attest, the conference is sure to not disappoint.  http://www.aacrao.org/seattle/

2. Also, relating to AACRAO, the annual NACRAO@AACRAO State Reception will be held Tuesday, March 15 at 6:30 p.m. at Gordon Biersch Brewery Restaurant. We will meet in the Pilsner room, which some of you will remember is the exact place of NACRAO@AACRAO in 2001 – our ten year anniversary!

Here is the link – http://www.gordonbiersch.com/locations/seattle-wa – and it’s conveniently located just a block away from the Convention Center.

3. The NACRAO Board is revisiting all of our technology/communcation pieces this year, including the website, with hopes to streamline all of the resources the NACRAO membership has at it’s disposal.  Some of the new items will include an archive of all previous Board Minutes, a more user-friendly Membership Directory, an online repository of forms/surveys/applications, ongoing committee updates and a continual news feed of the good work our institutions are doing. We hope you will find these resources useful and informative in the work you do for our organization and your respective institution!

Enjoy your year, and I hope to see you at Fall Conference, Nov. 9, 10, 11 2011 in Hastings, Nebraska.

Have a great weekend,

Matt Schill, NACRAO President

“Get Your Caboose to North Platte”
Wednesday, November 10 – Friday, November 12
North Platte Sandhills Convention Center [http://sandhillcc.com/ ]

2010 NACRAO Conference Sessions Include:
High School Student Panel
Changes in Financial Aid for 2010-2011
Veteran Student Services-Help better serve this population
Registar’s Visit Program
Committee Budget Workshop
New Student Orientation: Small Budget, Big Impact
NACRAO Board Presentation: Changes to positions, discussion and ideas for the board
Story Telling: Student Tour Guides make a powerful difference
New Counselor Workshop: Follow-up round table
FERPA Update-Roundtable and mini-session
Creating and Using Survey Tools in Your Profession
Campus Emergencies: What you need to know, how they affect you and your students
Professional Development Matters

Dana College has been a dedicated NACRAO member for many years and many of us can link close friends from Dana ties.  We wish their students, faculty, and staff all the best.

-Jason J. Blohm, NACRAO President

As most of our member institutions have had their commencement ceremonies it is unofficially summer for us all.  Rest assured that although this means family vacations, fun in the sun, and ice-cold beverages, your NACRAO committees and Board of Directors is still working hard for the memebership!

The end of April marked the 100^th year celebration of AACRAO.  We had 8 NACRAOians in attendance to represent our state down in New Orleans at the Annual Meeting.  With belt-tightening budgets, and a slew of our state colleges and universities knee-deep in an SIS implementation, the low numbers were not surprising.  No worries though; Central CC-Grand Island, Creighton, Metropolitan CC, UNL, and Midland held it down in the “Big Easy.”

As I mentioned, the machine that is NACRAO is chugging along quite nicely.  The following events are sure to draw interest from the membership:

REGISTRAR’S DAY

Central Community College-Grand Island, June 22.  Cost will be $25

 Topics will include FERPA:  What does it mean to our institutions? & A book discussion on John Kotter’s Our Iceberg is Melting:  Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions.

 NEW COUNSELOR’S WORKSHOP

August 12 and 13 in Kearney. 

 The committee is working hard to ensure that a top notch event is in place to train our new admissions professionals (or maybe even refresh some of our wily veterans).

 FALL CONFERENCE

Mark your calendars now to make the trek to North Platte for some “train”ing in professional development.  The 2010 NACRAO Fall conference is November 10, 11, & 12, you don’t want to miss out!

Please visit our website nacrao.org regularly for further details involving these and other NACRAO events. 

Enjoy the “down time” over the summer,

Jason J. Blohm, MPA

President, Nebraska Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers

As I type this message, I can hardly believe that we are into March already for 2010.  If you are like me, you have Spring fever after the recent blast of semi-warm air and the white stuff finally giving way to puddles (or ponds) in backyards.

At the end of February, your Board of Directors was finally able to hold the annual retreat to gear up for what 2010 brings to our fine organization.  We all left UNO feeling energized and excited about what our membership can do to advance higher education in our state.

So, as a member of NACRAO, I urge you to do what you can to make that statement come true.  Involvement is easy, and can be as simple as volunteering at our annual Fall Conference, serving on a committee, or taking advantage at the plethora of professional development activities that NACRAO offers.  NACRAO thrives by the involvement of the membership and quite frankly, we need to have your involvement to continue thriving and build on the positive momentum we have experienced.

As of today, we are still in need of some of you to step up and get involved.  Two areas of specific need are the Post-Secondary Planning/EPP Committee and the Research Committee.   The first is a very important committee collaboratively led by NACRAO and EducationQuest to coordinate and set the schedule for the “college fair circuit” in Nebraska (Les Monroe, lesm@educationquest.org).  The Research Committee has been ignored by our organization too long, and our VP of Membership has some exciting ideas to revitalize and make it be an asset to our organization (Mike Kolker, mike.kolker@bellevue.edu).  I personally urge you to step outside your comfort zone and get involved in one of these committees that need your help!

One final note, as if being President of NACRAO was not enough of a change for me this year, I accepted a position as Director of Student Recruitment at Midland Lutheran College.  I am very excited to continue to work with all of you and build on the relationships I have established during my wonderful time at UNO.

Yours in higher education,

Jason J. Blohm, President

Nebraska Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers

Don’t be haunted by missing this year!!!

http://www.nacrao.org/page4.php

Fall Conference Schedule

Registration and Information

Monday-Tuesday
October 5-6, 2009
University of Nebraska-Omaha
CPACS Building – The Commons

Registration deadline is Friday, September 25 – Please encourage your staff to attend one of these sessions

There is a registration fee of $25/person which includes breakfast & lunch.  Dress is casual.
Registration & breakfast will be from 8:30 – 9:00, the workshop will begin promptly at 9:00 & end at approximately 3:45

This year’s theme is “Out of the Blue – meeting the unexpected” – identical sessions offered on both days include:

Violence in the Workplace – video plus discussion with panel including security and human resources personnel

Birds of a Feather – Discussions/brainstorming with others on relevant issues

Heads & Tails of Money Management – riding out the economic rollercoaster

When It’s NOT What You Expected – Diversity Issues

Check out the college fair schedule for Nebraska Community Colleges.

Four-year colleges interested in attending the transfer fairs need to contact the fair organizer for each community college to RSVP.

Questions or comments regarding the Transfer Fair schedule can be directed to Cindy Cammack at UNL.  ccammack1@unl.edu

August 6th & 7th, 2009 NACRA-OK Corral (UNK Alumni House)

Registration fee is $50.00 per person, which includes meals, social activity, and workshop materials to keep for further reference.

A few tips for workshop attendees:

• Dress is CASUAL both days!  Feel free to wear your college’s apparel on Friday!
• Western wear is encouraged for Thursday evening’s social activity, so be sure to pack those boots and spurs!
• Bring business cards to share for networking opportunities.
• Please bring a gift from your school to exchange as door prizes.
• Attendees will receive a pre-loaded USB drive with workshop materials.  If you want to view this for note-taking during the workshop, please bring your own laptop.

Questions? Contact :
Amy Carpenter, Wayne State-(402)375-7028 or amcarpe1@wsc.edu
Jael Roschewski, UNK-(308)865-8703 or roschewskijj@unk.edu