We need your help!

The MASFAA Communications and Electronic Initiatives Committee is hard at work building a new website for the association! As we begin to map everything out, we would like input from YOU regarding what you like about the current website, what you dislike, what you would like to see more of, etc.

Please take a few moments to complete the survey below about the current MASFAA website, and what you would like to see on the new website.


https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/M6X3HLC

 Your feedback is very important to us!

Thank you!

MASFAA Communications and Electronic Initiatives Committee

Want to Make Something Great?

Have you ever had that one project you really wanted to do, but you didn’t feel like you had quite enough resources to make it happen as quickly as you’d like?  But if you got what you needed to make it happen, you just know it would be great!

That’s kind of what we feel with a terrific project our Communications and Electronic Initiatives Committee is doing.  They have taken on the ambitious challenge of setting up a totally new web presence for MASFAA.  Using a tool called Wild Apricot, this strong team has started diving in to restructure and design our new MASFAA website from scratch.  It’s a meaningful thing that we are all eager to see succeed this year.  There’s plenty of work to be done and having some additional MASFAA members join in would make things flow even better. 

Do you like being part of a team that is making something special happen?  Would you enjoy being able to help launch something that will be noticed for a long time?  Here’s your chance.  Complete a Volunteer Form today and mark that you want to be a part of the Communications/Electronic Initiatives Committee for 2016-2017. 

Thomas Ratliff

MASFAA President

***Note, the Communications and Electronic Initiatives Committee is having their first committee meeting next week, so please volunteer today!

What is Communications & Electronic Initiatives? (and how you can help!)

Hello from beautiful Kansas City! Conference has gotten off to a wonderful start, we’ve laughed, we’ve cried, we’ve handed out some awards, and I encourage you to check out MASFAA’s twitter account (@masfaaweb) if you don’t already follow the twitter to see some of yesterday’s action.  You can also follow other conference attendees’ tweets at #mymasfaa to see what’s happening.

The Communications and Electronic Initiatives Committee is gearing up for a big year, and we’re looking for a few brave souls to help us with our mission.  Curious about that long title and what we really do?  Right now, you’re reading part of it.  The blog is one of our main functions – making sure the membership stays informed of what MASFAA is doing through communication in a timely fashion through blog articles, and we also solicit other articles we think the membership would enjoy (think the Leadership Spotlights or Zach’s Technology in the Office post).

Speaking of timely communication, the twitter account is another one of the ways that the committee gets the word out to the members about what’s going on – either in the association or in the financial aid world at large.  We know that some folks would prefer to read a blog and don’t really do the twitter thing, and some folks really tweet it up – that way, people have options when it comes to us putting information out and ways for people to communicate back to the association.

There’s also a Facebook group for MASFAA – if you’re a part of it, awesome!  One of the tasks this committee has been charged with is converting that from a closed group to a “like” page, so that’s something that we’ll be taking on this year.  Work on that has already begun, but with all of the other tasks we have, it’s not an overnight switch.

Ah, yes. “Other tasks.”  If you like website work…here’s where you come in!  Our committee is also in charge of the MASFAA website, and we’re going to be doing some WORK to that this year.  I would LOVE to have some folks help out with that – we’re going to be doing some really rewarding work.

Please feel free to contact me with questions about the committee – I’m happy to answer anything.  Definitely volunteer to help us have a successful year in 16-17!

Jayme Jarrett,
Chair, Communications & Electronic Initiatives
j-jarrett@onu.edu

Tech Tips to Stay on Top

Do you live in a world where you have enough time to read and listen to everything you need to know? No. No you do not. And neither do I. We do, however, live in a world where the resources to keep up with the onslaught of information are getting better and better.

Today’s post is the first in a series aimed at sharing technological resources that you can use to bring efficiency and adaptability to your life. Each has varying degrees of difficulty to implement, but that’s why we have friends in IT, right?

This Week’s Tip: Zamzar – Online File Conversion

http://www.zamzar.com/

Do you ever listen to webinars from ED? Aren’t they great? Except that the files are in .wmv format, which means you have to sit at a Windows computer and watch the darn thing for two hours.

What if you could convert those time-consuming video files to audio and download them to your iPhone or other portable device so you can listen on the go?

Enter Zamzar.

Download the .wmv file from IFAP to your computer and then simply upload it to the Zamzar website under Step 1 of their website. Choose the file type that works best for you in Step 2. If you aren’t sure what format to use for your device, .mp3 and .wav are likely what you need. Enter your email address in Step 3 and wait for the converted file to arrive. You can download the converted file from your email and then upload to your device through programs like iTunes.

When 150% sub was rolling out, I found the 5 part webinar series really helpful. Sitting and watching the webinar once was about all I had time to do. When I found I could convert the file and put it on my iPhone to listen to during my commute or while on the treadmill (fake example), I listened to those webinars several times over. Being able to engage complex information repeatedly helped me with understanding a lot of the nuances and examples ED laid out.

Note: There is an option to do RSS feeds on the IFAP website if you’re into that kind of thing.

If you have never attended one of ED’s webinars or looked through their archive, take some time today to see what they have. If you see something and think ain’t nobody got time for that, you might find Zamzar to be a useful tool.