A Note from Midwestern Region VP Ileana Rodriguez
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As a membership association, one of the most important jobs the College Board has is developing educators to support the pursuit of their professional and institutional goals. This fall, more than 4,600 educators have been taking advantage of professional development opportunities offered by the College Board throughout the Midwestern Region. While we are best known for AP® and Pre-AP® workshops that prepare teachers to offer AP courses, this fall we also launched a new series of Student Search Service® (SSS®) workshops for higher education admission professionals focused on best practices in strategic and cost-effective efforts to reach prospective students. To learn more about these SSS workshops, please visit www.collegeboard.com/mw-search.
Thanks to all of our colleagues from the Midwestern states who attended Forum 2009 in New York Oct. 21–23. Our gratitude to everyone who woke up early and joined us for the Midwestern Regional breakfast — especially to Nicki Roberson from Bradley University, chair of the Midwestern Regional Council, and College Board Trustee Mabel Freeman from The Ohio State University for addressing our group. We hope everyone enjoyed the wonderful sessions and social gatherings.
On Oct. 27–28, the College Board hosted colleagues from institutions in the Big 12 at a conference in Boulder, Colo., for a policy event titled “What the New Era of Education Reform Means for Higher Education.” Speakers included Sandy Baum, co-chair of the Rethinking Student Aid study group and a College Board senior policy analyst, who presented “Rethinking Federal Financial Aid: Moving Closer to Meaningful Reform,” and David Longanecker, president of WICHE, who presented “Insights into Obama’s College Access & Completion Fund and the Implications of Stimulus Spending.”We were pleased to have Midwestern representatives from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and the University of Kansas at this gathering. You can read more about the event in this issue of Connection.
The Midwestern Region is pleased to announce the appointment of Abigale Walls as our region’s director of district outreach. Recent efforts to provide support to our members in the pursuit of the various funding threads of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 have been very well received. ARRA’s $787 billion will infuse almost $100 billion in new funds into federal education programs. ARRA contains nearly two times the overall funding for the entire annual federal education budget. The College Board stands ready to help partner and provide support at the crossroads of such a historic event. In her new role, Abigale will provide support to districts throughout the region in the pursuit of federal and state education funding opportunities to help connect students to college success. For more information about ARRA funding and how our regional office of the College Board can be a resource to you, please e-mail arra@collegeboard.org.
We are all looking forward to the Midwestern Regional Forum, being held Feb. 21–22, 2010, at the Chicago Marriott Downtown. This forum is a great opportunity for our Midwestern colleagues to network, gain professional development tools and contribute to the innovations that will revolutionize education. Having built a reputation as one of the most successful urban district superintendents in the country, Deborah Jewell-Sherman, one of our keynote speakers, will present a comprehensive framework for closing the achievement gap. You can register now for the 2010 Midwestern Regional Forum at www.collegeboard.com/mroforum.
Hope to see you in February in Chicago. Which reminds me, stay warm!
College Board Hosts Big 12 Schools for Boulder Education Policy Event
The College Board Advocacy group teamed up with staff members from the Midwestern, Southwestern and Western regional offices to host an event for the schools of the Big 12 in Boulder, Colo., Oct. 27–28. The program, “What the New Era of Education Reform Means for Higher Education,” immediately followed the annual meeting of admission, enrollment, financial aid, student services and other professionals from the Big 12 — a college athletic conference composed of 12 schools from Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas. Attendees learned about the latest news from Capitol Hill on policy related to admission, financial aid and college completion, with a focus on how these developments can advance the participating institutions’ goals. College Board staff shared exclusive data for Big 12 institutions and facilitated a conversation on how these data could be used to advance enrollment and completion objectives of particular concern to Big 12 institutions.
After a welcome from Southwestern Regional Vice President Ann Wright, the group heard from Sandy Baum, College Board senior policy analyst and co-chair of the Rethinking Student Aid study group, who gave a talk titled “Rethinking Federal Financial Aid: Moving Closer to Meaningful Reform.” David Longanecker, president of WICHE and former Clinton administration undersecretary of education, spoke about demographics and shared insights into President Obama’s $2.5-billion College Access and Completion Innovation Fund and stimulus spending. A major part of the event involved Big 12 data presentations by Arthur Doyle, College Board vice president, and Julie Esau and Leslie Larocca, both senior directors for higher education in the Southwestern and Midwestern regions, respectively. For the first time, university attendees were able to view data across the conference along with information specific to their schools.
“We were pleased to have representatives from most Big 12 universities at this gathering,” said Wright. “All of the attendees stated their appreciation for such a high-level conference, saying also that they had no idea that the College Board had so many valuable programs.”
The next morning, Bruce Walker, vice provost for special projects at The University of Texas at Austin and head of the College Board’s Task Force on Admissions in the 21st Century, offered an update on his group’s work, which included a video clip from the movie Apollo 13 that demonstrated how to deal with a crisis using only the tools you have on the table — equating the space crisis with the current crisis in admission and financial aid. “The symposium was excellent and we look forward to participating in more regional forums with the College Board,” said attendee Christy Crenshaw, director of undergraduate admissions at Oklahoma State University. “I think all of our admission counselors as well as our admission management team will benefit greatly.”
College Board Members Elect New Trustee from the Midwestern Region
At the Annual Meeting of the Members of the College Board, which took place Oct. 23 at Forum 2009, seven Trustees were elected to the 31-member governing board of the association. In addition, two Trustees who were appointed by regional assemblies last winter were installed.
In the Midwestern Region, Lloyd G. Jackson, president of Jackson Gas Company in Hamlin, W.Va., was elected to a two-year term as Trustee and will serve from 2009 to 2011.
The College Board’s Trustees are responsible for assisting in legal and fiduciary decisions; approving the mission, strategic goals and objectives of the organization; establishing policies; and advising those responsible for the management of the organization. The Board of Trustees administers the not-for-profit association with guidance from three national assemblies and six regional assemblies. Member institutions appoint a delegate to each of the three national assemblies — the Academic Assembly, the College Scholarship Service Assembly, and the Guidance and Admission Assembly. Each national assembly provides the College Board with guidance on the issues and College Board activities related to the professional areas represented.
Events & Workshops
Click here to see events and workshops in the Midwestern Region.
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