WASFAA Communications Committee Conference Call
July 2, 2014, 11am
Attended: Ashley Coleman (Chair), Ashley Munro, Sun Ow, Ashley Salisbury
1) Discussed this year’s committee goals
a) Work with WASFAA committees to advertise events, disseminate information, and keep
members informed of activities
b) Increase member interaction in social media
i) President Jensen’s goal this year is member engagement
c) Consider alternative method of delivering news other than newsletter
i) Kevin suggested a “news room” similar to NASFAA News Today
2) Discussed assigning duties for the year
a) Options are: editing newsletter articles, posting to twitter, posting to Facebook, posting to the
Water Cooler blog, posting to LinkedIn, or other such as taking pictures and posting while at a
WASFAA event
b) Stats on communication methods:
i) Facebook: 274 likes
ii) Twitter: 50 followers
iii) Blog: 83 subscribers
iv) LinkedIn: 699 members
v) Newsletter: Ashley S will see how many hits on newsletter for past year
c) Ashley S and Sun are willing to be editors. Sun will also try to get vendors to pay for ads for the
blog. Ashley M is willing to do anything except post to Twitter
i) Ashley C will check with other committee members for preferences
3) Discussed most effective methods of communication
a) Twitter doesn’t get much activity- should we delete it?
i) Abril Hunt started Twitter for those that may use it
ii) Ashley C: We have very few followers, hardly any re-tweets or favorites
iii) Ashley S: Twitter and Facebook were linked so same post goes to both
(1) Ashley C: I unlinked them, but we can link together so no one would have to monitor
Twitter
b) WASFAA Water Cooler
i) Ashley C: It was mentioned at the last EC meeting that blogging may be dead, should we
disband blog?
(1) Ashley S: It’s worth it to try to revitalize blog to what it was intended to be in the first
place, don’t get rid of it yet
(2) Sun and Ashley M: I read blog
(3) Ashley S: We should have someone that is interested in spearheading the blog to make it
something great
ii) Ashley C: At the EC meeting, we talked about the original intention of the blog, which was
more of a listserv- members posting questions and getting answers. Thoughts on re-starting
this?
WASFAA Communications Committee Conference Call
July 2, 2014, 11am
(1) Ashley C: Ideas were to have a new discussion topic every 2 weeks or so (SAP, Processing
System/FAMS) and have members from EC respond to questions
(a) The Communications Committee would be a part of advertising the discussion and
monitoring discussions
(2) What’s the best location for this? Blog? LinkedIn?
(a) Ashley S: Starting on blog would be good, then if popular moving to LinkedIn. Have
heard about protesting groups targeting memberships like ours on LinkedIn.
(b) Ashley C: We have ability to block users on LinkedIn if necessary. We would have to
get more subscribers to blog, we only have 83
(c) Ashley M: Only that many subscribers, but many more hits to website
(d) Some possible content ideas: there is talk of lowering aggregate loan limits, higher
interest rates making a difference?, federal issues topics
(3) Next steps: Lakia Wilson, Membership Chair, is gathering interest from EC, perhaps
starting a group
(a) Ashley C will keep committee updated
c) Newsletter
i) Kevin mentioned that he thinks the newsletter format is a little outdated and we should
look for more of a “news room” format, similar to NASFAA Today’s News emails
(1) Ashley S: Had conference call with Kevin and ATAC, and it sounds possible that our
website can handle that
(2) Sun: It’s a good idea- people won’t read it unless you push them to through an email.
How often would we send it? How would we get articles?
(3) Ashley M: Likes the idea, but daily emails like NASFAA is too much, they end up getting
deleted. Weekly emails?
(4) Ashley C: I also like the idea, but I’m concerned about having enough content to push out
to membership.
ii) Next step is for ATAC to present to EC about what’s possible
(1) Ashley C will update committee on results of meeting
4) Status of summer edition newsletter
a) All articles are gathered and were sent to Barry Age who does the formatting
b) Timeline was pushed back to wait for articles from Summer Institute
c) Hope is to email out final draft to committee on Monday, June 7th for final review
d) Ashley C: I sent out editing to 5 committee members and gave them a week timeline. Only 3
responded.
i) If you choose to be a newsletter editor, you must stick to the deadlines for editing
e) Ashley C: There were no articles from membership for this edition. How can we get some?
i) Ashley M and Ashley S offered to write if needed
ii) If you have an event you go to, or anything at all that may be of interest to the membership,
please consider writing an article or letting me know a topic to try and find an author