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2007
National PowerFAIDS User Conference Sessions
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Presenter:
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Anthony Erwin, Director of Financial
Aid Services, Northeastern University
Nick Zinser, Associate Director for
Financial Services Systems,
Northeastern University |
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Advanced Packaging Capabilities
Location: Hampton Ballroom
You’ve mastered the basics…so now what? Equity, Scan
Groups, Entitlements, Aid Preference and the obligatory TFC/Need
based funds. Multiple packaging strategies, renewal awards,
100% IM/FM Need, algorithms and how to allocate funding
based on other factors. Come learn, share and discuss the
details of these advanced aspects of automated Packaging.
What works for some might work for others – so come learn
and share the possibilities and capabilities.
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Presenter:
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Algorithms
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Want to know what algorithms are? Come to this session
to learn about the different types of algorithms, how you
can use them, and why you should be using this fantastic
PowerFAIDS feature. You will also learn how to string
algorithms together to find answers to questions. This will
help you begin to see how this feature can change how you
use PowerFAIDS.
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Presenter:
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Valerie A. Mockus, President,
Apple Pi Consulting
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Basic
Communications Q & A
Location: Congressional Room
If you have not yet implemented Communications in
PowerFAIDS, this session is for you. Using the File vs.
Database method for storing templates. Assigning templates
to letters. Letter attributes. Using the sample letter
templates from the PowerFAIDS website. Using simple merge
fields and float-in fields. Advanced topics will not be
discussed; therefore, if you have not begun using
Communications in PowerFAIDS and want to know just the
basics to get started, learn the minimum to get you printing
letters within minutes.
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Presenter:
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Kelly Skubal, Training Development Specialist, The College Board |
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Can PowerFAIDS Help Automate Verification Flow?
Location: Hampton Ballroom
PowerFAIDS has the capability to help you automate the
detailed and time consuming process of verification. This
session will walk through this process from the time an ISIR
is received up. Some of the highlights include;
automatically adding documents needed to clear data match
and c-flag issues, using the Verification page to update FM
tax data (both with and without IDOC) and sending correction
files to CPS.
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Presenter:
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College Board
Professional Development Event: Financial Aid Update at
NASFAA
Location: The Omni Shoreham Hotel, Congressional Room
The Financial Aid Update Session will review important
enhancements to PROFILE, FAST, and IDOC for the 2008-09
financial aid cycle. Attendees will learn about the results
of the first year of the “adaptive PROFILE” and review plans
for further customization of the application. The session
will also provide an update about planned modifications to
the Institutional Methodology for 2008-09 and beyond.
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Presenter:
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Linda Peckham, Director,
Communication and Training,
The College Board
Julia Padgett, Director, FAS Implementation and New User
Support
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CommonLine Loan Disbursement Authorization
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Do you want to improve relations between the Aid Office
and the Bursar? Come learn the benefits of using the
CommonLine LDA to transmit approval for your Business
Officer to release FFELP and Alternative Loan funds in NET
amounts (rather than gross amounts) so that the Bursar and
the Aid Office can easily reconcile disbursements.
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Presenter:
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Nick Zinser, Associate Director for
Financial Services System,
Northeastern University
Ilene Codden,
Associate Director
for Financial Aid, Tufts University |
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Community College Issues Round Table Discussion
Location: Executive Room
Come join our round table discussion on various aspects
of student aid processing specific to community colleges.
This session will provide an opportunity for users to meet
and discuss common issues and experiences with PowerFAIDS.
Bring your ideas, your thinking caps, tips, and any
challenges you are encountering.
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Presenter:
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TBA
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Distance Learning
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Explore the opportunities and challenges of
administering financial aid to students who
learn over the Internet. Topics include: NetPartner,
high-volume processing in a 24/7
environment, nontraditional students, nontraditional
calendars, borrower-based academic
years, cost of attendance budgets, and SAP.
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Presenter:
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Electronically Authorizing Your Disbursements
Location: Hampton Ballroom
This session will cover transmitting financial aid
awards in order to credit or debit student
accounts. The session will include a review of set-up
parameters.
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Presenter:
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Dana Baumgartner, Associate
Director of Student Financial
Services, Trinity University |
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Exploring Financial Aid Implications of Changing
Demographics
Location: Empire Room
Explore the current research suggesting that the
demographic and economic backgrounds of future college
students will be vastly different than that of current
entering classes. Population trends, predicted high school
graduation rates and socioeconomic data indicate that
students applying to your institutions in the year 2010 and
beyond will represent increasingly diverse, multi-ethnic,
and bi-lingual characteristics of the population. In
addition, students entering your institutions over the next
decade will likely demonstrate higher levels of financial
need, which will impact financial aid budgets, policies and
student support services. This workshop will help
participants understand and predict the impact on their
institutional grant levels, packaging guidelines, and
institutional enrollment goals.
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Presenter:
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John Flemming, Senior Higher
Education
Manager,
The College
Board
Sean Smith, Director of Financial
Aid,
Scripps College |
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Financial Aid Management for Directors
Location: Empire Room
This session will explore the beauty and use of standard
and periodic reports. Learn where the useful data is hidden
in these reports. Learn to manipulate the “canned” reports
to your benefit and glory. You might even learn to create
statistical abstracts which will WOW any politician,
reporter or just nosy supervisor.
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Presenter:
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Heather C. McDonnell, Director of
Financial Aid, Sarah Lawrence
College
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Help, I Have a Question
Location: Executive Room
handout:
User Guide at a Glance
handout:
Website at a Glance
Ever wonder where to go to get information quickly? In
this session, you will learn how to use all of the
PowerFAIDS resources available to you. Information on
PowerFAIDS training begins your quest; then you will learn
how to navigate the Web Site, how to read and search the
User Guide, and what to communicate when you contact
Technical Support.
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Presenter:
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Judi Carpenter, User Support
Analyst,
The College Board
Barbara Weber, Senior Software
Training
and Professional
Services Specialist,
The College Board |
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How Suite It Is! Institutional Experiences Using Integrated Financial Aid Products
Location: Executive Room
PowerFAIDS is one component of the College Board’s suite
of financial aid products. CSS/PROFILE, NonCustodial
PROFILE, and IDOC are integrated with, and designed to
complement, PowerFAIDS. In this session, you will hear from
institutional practitioners
who use multiple College Board financial aid products. This
panel discussion will highlight how these products and
services are used to improve the quality of data received
from students and to streamline the processing flow.
Panelists will also share their ideas
on best practices and the competitive advantages they gain
by use of PowerFAIDS in combination with other CSS®
products. Schools of various size and operational practices
are represented to give the audience a broad perspective of
experiences.
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Presenter:
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IDOC User
Group Breakfast at NASFAA
Location: The Omni Shoreham Hotel, Forum Room
Please join us for breakfast anytime between 7:00 and
7:30 a.m. We will begin the discussion at 7:30 a.m. and end
by 8:30 a.m., which will give you time to attend that day’s
sessions at the NASFAA conference. This forum will provide
an opportunity to meet your IDOC colleagues and College
Board staff and discuss your experiences with IDOC over the
past year. We will provide product updates and give you a
chance to share information and ideas, and identify current
issues.
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Presenter:
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Joel Goldman, Director, Financial Aid Services, The College
Board
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If You
Think the College Board’s PROFILE Application Is Not For
Your Students, Take a Fresh Look
Location: The Marriott Wardman Hotel, Room Balcony D
Students have a story to tell and the adaptive CSS/PROFILE
can help them tell it faster while giving you robust
information on which to base your institutional awards. If
you worry about how to deal with federal simplicity in an
increasingly complex financial world, learn how the PROFILE
streamlines the application for the lowest-income families
while collecting more data from those with complex financial
situations, including business owners. Case studies will
demonstrate how the number of questions varies by student
based on their financial situation and how the data
collected can help you distinguish the truly needy from the
“tax-form” needy.
The smarter CSS/Financial Aid PROFILE®—a tool to help you
award your institutional funds sensitively, strategically,
and efficiently.
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Presenter:
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Linda Peckham, Director,
Communication and Training,
The College Board
Susan McCrackin, Director, Program Development and
Implementation,
The College Board
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Integrating PowerFAIDS with Microsoft Access and SQL
Location: Executive Room
This session will demonstrate how to interface
PowerFAIDS by using two methods: (1) using Microsoft Access
to create an external data file and (2) how to use stored
procedures to write data directly into the external data
table. By using either of these two methods in an external
database, you can
successfully interface PowerFAIDS with any external system.
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Presenter:
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Kevin Paskvan, Associate Director of Financial Aid, Kenyon College |
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Presenter:
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Jenzabar Staff
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Loans A to Z
Location: Empire Room
An overview of how loans are processed in PowerFAIDS
with a review of the various fields and views that are used
for loan processing. We will explore loans from parameter
set-ups through disbursements. We’ll look at Standard
Reports that help you manage the entire process. This is a
“best practices” approach to loan processing in the
Financial Aid Office.
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Presenter:
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Aaron Clark,
Assistant Director,
Financial Services System,
Northeastern University
Nick Zinser, Associate Director for
Financial Services System,
Northeastern University |
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Maintaining Your SQL Server Database
Location: Executive Room
This session is designed to inform you of the techniques
for protecting your data. It will cover the best practices
for insuring that your data is valid and techniques to
properly maintain your data before it results in a loss of
data. Approaches to specific topics such as Golden User,
Security, database backup and restore will be discussed.
This session is targeted towards schools running their
PowerFAIDS database on the MS SQL Server Platform.
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Presenter:
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Debbie
Gronback, Admissions and
Financial Aid Systems Officer,
Harvard Divinity School
Edward Murphy, Senior Technical Specialist,
The College Board |
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Make Your Life Easier - Learn How to Use Basic Packaging
Features
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Did you know that you do not need to enter each fund
individually on the packaging screen when awarding students?
Do you know the capabilities of automating Packaging for
some or all of the funds you award? Do you know how easy it
is to determine eligibility and Package federal, state and
other institutional awards? Don’t be afraid of this dynamic
feature! Come and learn the basics of Packaging - how to use
it and how it can save you lots of time and marvelously
improve the accuracy of your financial aid awarding.
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Presenter:
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Me, You and EU
Location: Executive Room
PowerFAIDS External Update (EU) is one of the cogs that
makes PowerFAIDS tick. Loading information efficiently into
your database can streamline your eligibility and tracking,
and enhance your customer service. This session will explore
some of the many variables to consider when setting up an EU
routine.
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Presenter:
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Tim Tarpley,
Senior Associate Director
of Admissions and Financial Aid, Berry College |
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Mission, Margin, or Both?
How Data Analysis and Modeling Can Help You Find the Balance
Location: The Marriott Wardman Hotel, Room 822
Institutions find themselves grappling with the
question, “Are we awarding our aid dollars in ways that
support our goals?” Often these discussions result in policy
changes, the consequences of which may be hard to predict.
This session will assist attendees in understanding the uses
and benefits of modeling and will feature the College
Board’s Financial Aid Strategy Tool (FAST). Join this
discussion about balancing competing priorities and how
statistical modeling can provide data to enable informed
decisions.
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Presenter:
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Anne Sturtevant, Director, Financial
Aid Solutions, The College Board
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PowerFAIDS - A Director's Best Friend
Location: Empire Room
This session will explore how PowerFAIDS is your very
best friend on campus. We’ll take a look at how to amaze
your auditor with explicit data and beautifully arrayed
reports. We’ll discuss how PowerFAIDS helps discover your
weakest link and how to find those material inaccuracies
that cause great stress.
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Presenter:
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Heather C. McDonnell, Director of
Financial Aid, Sarah Lawrence
College
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PowerFAIDS
Net Partner
Location: Executive Room
PowerFAIDS Net Partner is a great tool that can allow
your office to extend its communication capabilities beyond
the constraints of geography and traditional office hours.
Learn how Net Partner can help you enhance the services you
provide to students and improve your internal processes as
well! This session will cover Net Partner fundamentals,
setup, and recent updates in addition to a best practices
discussion and examples of successful Net Partner
implementations.
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Presenter:
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Kevin Jensen, Director of Financial
Aid,
Treasure Valley Community
College
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Recruitment PLUS
Location: Congressional Room
Managing prospective students has always been a
challenge, but in today’s world it is even more complex—and
the process is continually expanding. Students and parents
have high expectations and competition is stiff. It is
difficult to be effective without the right tools. This
session will highlight the benefits and features of
Recruitment PLUS and show you how it can empower enrollment
management professionals by leveraging internal and external
data to drive personalized, customized communication with
all appropriate constituencies—without tying up precious IT
resources.
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Presenter:
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Murry Evans, Higher Education
Manager (SRO), The College Board |
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Scheduling Yourself Out of a Job
Location: Executive Room
Have you ever felt like kicking yourself for not running
that report yesterday? Is it two days past your census date
and you forgot to externally update enrollment information
from your Registrar? What are the minimum requirements for
running the Scheduler. What can you accomplish with the
Scheduler? Join us for answers to these questions and more!
This session will take you step-by-step through the
scheduling of your Scheduler.
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Presenter:
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Presenter:
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TBA
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The College Board Washington Office
Location: Empire Room
handout
handout
handout
handout
State and federal policy issues have become increasingly
important in expanding access and opportunity for all
students, especially students from low-income backgrounds
and minority students. This discussion will focus on the
scope and direction of the College Board’s public policy and
advocacy agenda.
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Presenter:
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Thomas W. Rudin, Senior Vice
President for Advocacy,
Government Relations and
Development, The College Board |
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The Process of Checks and Balances
Location: Executive Room
Quality Control has been defined as the inspection,
analysis and action required to ensure the quality of
output. OK – fine! So how can PowerFAIDS help with this
process? How can we write Quality Control Rules so that we
can be fairly confident in our practices and that the
outcome is what we anticipated? Come learn how to write
these rules and how to apply them in your institution. Put
some balance into your life by learning how the power behind
PowerFAIDS does the checking for you.
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Presenter:
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The Things I Forgot to Ask
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Have you learned too much over the last two days?
Feeling overwhelmed? Did you have a question on the tip of
your tongue that you just couldn’t ask before the end of the
session? Now is your chance. Fill out a question form at the
registration desk before noon Saturday and we will answer
your final questions during this session.
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Presenter:
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Judi Carpenter, User Support
Analyst,
The College Board
Kelly Skubal, Enrollment Services
Training and
Development
Specialist,
The
College Board
Barbara Weber, Senior Software
Training
and Professional
Services Specialist,
The College Board |
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Tips and Tricks with Communications
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Tired of boring letters? Want more options for
communicating with students? If you answered YES! This
session is for you. Come learn how to use PowerFAIDS and the
advanced features of Microsoft Word to create custom
communications. For those who have already made their
communications slick through Word, please join us and bring
along some examples to share.
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Presenter:
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Anthony Erwin, Director of Financial
Aid Services, Northeastern University |
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Presenter:
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Renee Wade, United States
Department of Education
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Washington CSI: The Case of the Asset Flew
Location: Empire Room
Financial aid administrators spend countless hours
comparing complicated tax return data with estimated income
data submitted each spring by families on the PROFILE and
FAFSA. Verifying a family’s asset information—home value,
business value, savings and investment value, real estate
property value—presents a more difficult verification
challenge. Many practitioners apply unique methods to
evaluate and substantiate a
family’s net worth for need analysis purposes. Some are
troubled by the extent to which substantial asset value is
depressed or simply omitted from official financial aid
applications. Panelists will reveal their investigative
techniques, document findings, and theorize about the
motivations of a growing number of filers stricken with a
case of the “asset flew.”
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Presenter:
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Gary Weaver, Associate Director of Student Aid, Bowdoin College
Gail Holt, Senior Associate Director of Student Aid,
Mount Holyoke College
Deborrah Glenn-Long, School
Consultant, Training and Techincal Assistance, CSLF |
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Where Have All the Shortcuts Gone?
Location: Executive Room
Ever wonder what those cute little icons do? Could there
be an easier way? Are there any PowerFAIDS hot keys? Join us
for this interactive session and discover these and other
tips make using PowerFAIDS faster and more effective.
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Presenter:
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Carri DiOnne, Software Products
Analyst,
The College Board
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Who Has the Time to Write this?
Location: Empire Room
What happens when the person in your office, who knows
everything, leaves? Where do you keep those Department of Ed
directives that only apply to your school? Is there an easy
reference guide for the newcomers to your office? Come
participate in a session designed to help you discover how
easy it is to write or update your Policies and Procedures
Manual. Find out what you did not already know about putting
this book together.
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Presenter:
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Writing Effective E-mail Communications Part I and Part II
Location: Empire Room
With the volume of e-mail escalating and the pressure to
write timely responses increasing, it’s more important than
ever to build powerful e-mail writing skills. In this two
part workshop and Q&A session, you will learn: (1) How to
structure your message so it gets read and acted upon. (2)
How to avoid sending attachments by integrating their
content into your message. (3) How to write a must-open
subject line. (4) How to summarize an ongoing e-mail
discussion for new participants. (5) Why you must present
the most important information at the beginning of your
message and how to do so and (6) how and why to maintain a
polite, professional tone. Come hone your e-mail writing
skills so your e-mail communication will be efficient and
direct.
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Presenter:
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You Aren't Alone!
How to Start a PowerFAIDS Users Group
Location: Executive Room
Have you ever wanted to make a change to your financial
aid process but didn’t want to reinvent the wheel? Do you
ever need help writing a report or tweaking your award
letter? If your area had a users group you could ask for
help or find somebody that had already been through the
process. This session will discuss ways to organize other
PowerFAIDS schools in your area into a users group. Together
you can find common processes and
share ideas. Sharing is fun!
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Presenter:
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Kathy Blaisdell, Director, Student
Financial Services, Mount
Holyoke
College
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You Can Get Any Data You Want from PowerFAIDS Report Writer
Location: Hampton Ballroom
Custom Reports can be tricky, but not if you approach it
logically. Come see some ways the Report Writer can work for
you! It is possible to access all the data in PowerFAIDS
using the features of the Report Writer module. Learn how to
generate and save reports in new formats. This session will
describe the new features of Report Writer including a look
at our new data grid that simplifies filtering (yes,
filtering), formatting, sorting, joins and more.
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Presenter:
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Dates - July
6-7, 2007