Hi, I'm SASFAA!

Members, with benefits!

Greetings!

It is a pleasure to serve this year as 2018-2019 Membership Chair!  

I'm Wayne Kruger, Executive Director of Financial Aid Operations at St. Petersburg College.  I most recently served SASFAA on the Executive Board as Secretary.    In this blog post I want to give you some ideas of how you can enjoy some of the many benefits of your SASFAA membership.

 

As your Membership Chair, I am here to help you with the following membership benefits: 

• ·         Would you like a membership certificate sent to you for this year?
• ·         Are you are locked out of the SASFAA site and the unlock features are not working.
• ·         Having issues with your Membership Renewal or have multiple accounts that need to be combined?
• ·         Having an issue registering for an event?
• ·         Hoping to get in touch with someone on our SASFAA Board about volunteer opportunities or need answers to other general questions you’re not finding the answer for.

For help with any of these areas, please feel free to email me at kruger.wayne@spcollege.edu and I will be happy to help you!

There are many benefits of being a SASFAA member.  While many of our website benefits are currently open to all SASFAA members (past and current), as the year goes on some website benefits may be available to paid members only. 

Being a SASFAA member allows you to get our Federal updates, Federal trainer, Dave Bartnicki's popular Bartnicki Bulletins, access to Training Webinars (we plan to offer more this year), and  SASFAA job postings and forums.  We are very proud of our in person trainings like the New Aid Officer Worship, the Management Symposium, Pre-conference workshops, and our Annual Conference.  

Please help support professional development for yourself and others be renewing your SASFAA membership today.

*Does your office want to renew everyone at once, or pay with one check? 

I am happy to help facilitate one group payment for your institution and we can email all your schools individual invoices to your billing/accounts person.  They can then list all the invoice numbers on one check for payment of all those in your office.

NOTE: If you are paying online via Credit Card or PayPal,  you will only be able to pay for one individual membership at a time. 

Looking forward to having a wonderful and successful year, and seeing you at upcoming events.  

Wayne Kruger
kruger.wayne@spcollege.edu

2018-2019 Membership Chair

Global Issues 101

Mia Mwango, FL Assoc. of Student Financial Aid Administrators


So, what in the world is Global Issues for SASFAA and FASFAA?

The Global Issues Committee will pursue the multifarious focuses of enhancing the inclusiveness of its membership to reflect the demographics of the student population it serves; will serve as the diversity subject matter leader and nexus for other SASFAA committees, and member state committees with similar focuses, and will pursue these goals to ensure the best inclusive financial aid practices.

Ok, that’s great. What’s diversity and inclusivity?

Diversity is variety and difference in the ways that a person can identify, the uniqueness within the human race. This includes but is not limited to race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, social class, physical ability or attributes, religious or ethical values system, national origin, and political beliefs.

Inclusion is celebrating the strength found among those differences and making a conscious effort to promote a sense of community, equality, fairness, respect and worth for everyone that is not based on any preconceived judgement or requirement to “fit.”

Why is it important? Why should I care?

Diversity and inclusion helps us reflect the communities and students we assist, and make them feel more comfortable. When students and parents identify with some of the people who are supporting them, there are often less feelings of inadequacy or of not belonging. This can be especially true of first generation students. While it’s not always 100% possible to do, many communities and organizations strive to reflect the makeup of the communities of which they are a part.

We also should be mindful that we are a part of exposing students to diversity, and teaching them inclusion. We lead by example. Diversity also means that sometimes people will be different from them, will not look like them or have the same race, gender identity, sexual orientation, physical ability, national origin, political belief or intellectual ability. That is why inclusion is so important to go along with diversity.

Now that I’m interested where can I learn more?

Our financial aid organizations like SASFAA and our state organizations in it will be doing articles just like these about global issues (diversity and inclusion). There will also be related professional development topics at your state and regional workshops and conferences when you attend.

Stay tuned!

You can also learn about these topics from human resources training, Publications like Diverse Issues in Higher Education, Florida College Access Network (FCAN), the Center for Law & Social Policy (CLASP), your school’s Diversity and/or Inclusion Office, etc.

Joan Bailey
joanbailey@health.usf.edu

2018-2019 Global Issues Chair