February 2011

I love this time of year!! I just read an application essay that brought me to tears, and an incredibly well-crafted recommendation that made me laugh out loud. (The dog raised his eyebrow in response.) For those of us lucky enough to be involved in college admissions (on the college side), we are racing to [...]

As we work on our new year’s resolutions and look forward to spring, the conference chairs are energetically planning the Annual Conference, Going the Extra Mile for Students.  Please mark your calendar for May 4-6th to join us for what promises to be an educational and fun-filled event.

With all due respect to Dan Brown and the Da Vinci Code, the Admission Practices Committee is not a secret society that meets in a hidden underground bunker somewhere in Illinois. Committee members are not a collection of zealous policing agents who are constantly on the prowl for violators of the Statement of Principles and [...]

In the spring of 2010, President Carin Smith created an Ad Hoc Committee to evaluate the IACAC Board Structure. The committee is comprised of Co-Chairs Sandie Gilbert (retired, Highland Park HS) and Maryanne Kelly (Maine South High School), members Nate Bargar (Illinois State University), Bob Murray (Illinois Wesleyan University) and Amy Thompson (York High School). [...]

All this and more awaits you at IACAC’s 2011 District Seminars. Check out the District Seminar website for a full listing of seminar descriptions and online registration. Each district has worked diligently preparing informative sessions that are not only educational, but also fun-filled.  All of the coordinators and their committees hope that these seminars will [...]

Are you willing to go the extra mile? Each year, IACAC holds a silent auction during its annual conference to help raise funds to support our educational programs. We are now accepting donations, gift baskets and gift cards for the silent auction and would love your support!

“Thanks to all of the generous donations from Project Reach, our homeless students received new book bags with packets of paper, notebooks, pens, pencils and calculators! We were able to stock the English department with Ayn Rand’s book; the library with The Great Books; the counseling and college lab with college and scholarship resource books; [...]

Movers and Shakers is way to share professionally-related news about promotions or moves to other institutions. Congratulations to the following members on their achievements:

The Media Communications Committee needs your help! We’ve received some great submissions for the name of our newsletter and we would love to see more. Keep those creative ideas coming! We will make an announcement of the new name at the Annual Conference in May, so go ahead and send us your best ideas.

The Illinois Student Assistance Commission is on their way to a location near your home or office.  The second series focuses on the Expert Guide: FASFA Relevant Documents and Student Eligibility Issues and FAFSA Expert Training: Need Analysis and EFC Calculations. The third series focuses on Financial Aid Packaging and The University Billing Cycle.