Board of Directors

WESTOP Board of Directors and Service Council Meeting
August 16, 2008 – Las Vegas, NV

• Call meeting to order – Tomasa Mauricio – 9:05am.
• Roll Call – quorum met; Cesar Alvarez absent, Research Chair position vacant.
• Guests: Jose Martinez-Saldana, Ralph Topete, Efrain Mercado
• Approval of Minutes:
• April 4, 2008 – motion to approve by Michelle Scott, second by Gilbert Acuna.
• April 10, 2008 – motion to approve by Silvester Mata, second by Howard Willis.
• Officer Reports:
• President – The biggest update is the Reauthorization of HEA.  The concern is that many more people will be eligible to apply for grants.  COE sent out a summary email regarding these changes, and questions that members had concerns about.
• DOE has put out a list of sites to be visited for monitoring.  Contact the WESTOP institutions on the list, and provide support for them.  President will make herself available to anyone who is contacted, as she went through an evaluation previously.  Important to set up an agenda and also a suggestion was to make sure to have a policy and procedure manual.
• Institutions were selected for the monitoring list due to the number of programs at an institution, and also based on the draw-down schedules, some have had complaints, institutional problems with accreditation, and other institutional problems that may not necessarily be TRIO related.  Jose Martinez-Saldana gave insight on selected sites.
• Reviewed COE annual conference and featured speakers.
• Hector Acosta from Arizona submitted a letter of resignation from his position as chapter president.  Working with Silvester Mata (past-president) on electing a current president.
• CFO – Has been working on updating items in quickbooks, and depositing checks.  Had to transfer bulk of maximzer account to cover bills in checking account.  There is a $15.00 per month fee for keeping maximize balance below $5000.  All outstanding conference invoices have been paid.  Awaiting checks still due to WESTOP.
• Pending actions: reimbursements for legitimate cancelations $>>/August 25th to submit reimbursements; reimbursements for airline cancelations $>>/August 25th who paid with personal funds, and September 15th for those who paid with institutional funds/checks.
• Balance currently – see report.
• President-Elect – Primarily responsible for the Service Council; and each committee will give their own report.  There are three priorities for service council – resource development, professional development, new professional development.
• In planning for conference, relooking at involvement of vendors and to make it more worthwhile.  Also discussed inconsistent information on mission/vision (part of the old Strategic Plan) and items that are posted on the website.  Will be working on consistent flowing of communication.  Planning to look into having a sponsor for covering costs of wireless and other technology at the annual conference.  In conjunction with 2010 conference in Long Beach, to host a McNair symposium.  New logo needs to be created, to replace the older one.
• Past-President :
• By-Laws revisions and changes before the next meeting.  Joy Brittain will be sending out an email to board to review for voting at next board meeting.  Also need to review the number of voting members per institutional membership, and also types of membership that needs by-laws changes.  President Tomasa Mauricio would like to appoint all chapter presidents to the By-Laws committee, and is the recommendation by Joy Brittain.  Priorities on report.
• Strategic Planning – last strategic plan ended 3 years ago.  At past conference past-WESTOP presidents met to discuss the future of WESTOP and gave recommendations.  Joy Brittain will receive notes from this meeting to pull ideas/concerns to update a new strategic plan.
• Chapter Reports:
• Arizona – Silvester Mata sitting in for resigned president Hector Acosta.  Awaiting resignation letter from him to the chapter.  A formal report was not submitted to Silvester Mata to present at Board meeting.  Chapter events and updates are in progress, due to the resignation.  Hector Acosta wanted to thank everyone in the chapter for their support.  Voting discussion will take place on pending issues including fees to be paid for presidents’ travel and money loan to WESTOP.  President Tomasa Mauricio personally thanked Silvester Mata for stepping in at the last minute to represent the Arizona chapter.
• Central Cal – Gave an update on the success of Summer Jam at the CSU Monterey campus.  The PDS is Ronert Park, not Napa Valley as shown on the report. Two action items on membership, and WESTOP loan for $5000 (does this include $2000 Palau travel?) and will be presented today.
• Nevada – First chapter meeting on August 6, 2008, and discussed goals and initiatives for the year which is a community service project, and will include Roberts own VUB program.  Will be held in the fall to include a visit to a veteran’s hospital.  UB students will be involved in this.  Also a fundraiser and was created by a VUB participant who was a former pre-college UB participant.  Tomasa Mauricio asked if NV would be interested in collaborating with NorCal for their PDS.  And Robert Hernandez and Howard Willis have been discussing this possibility.
• Northern Cal – Chapter meeting August 4th at Davis and has put in practice sending out the agenda ahead of time to ask for input.  Would like to acknowledge Eric Sanchez and Diana Garcia for continuing their roles in the chapter.  Had a successful fundraiser, NorCal polo shirts.  PDS is scheduled to take place at Embassy Suites in Napa Valley.  Things doing to enhance participation is Priority 1 training, exploring ideas for ETS proposal writing, and also other education equity issues to encourage non-TRIO professionals.  Chapter talked about collaborating and supporting the NV PDS, and also collaborating with CelCal on National TRIO day.  Would like to work on enhancing chapter websites.  Chapter wants board to prioritize reimbursements and to provide clarity on how the process goes, and looking at fiscal responsibilities and foresight and supporting new directors.  Another concern is looking at a zero based budget, meaning to spend no more than you have. 
• Pacific Islands – Len Woods filling in for Elvie Tyler.  Had the first meeting of executive board on August 12th, and expecting to having a meeting of the members on August 20th via PEACESAT (polycom), and a strategic planning meeting on August 29th in Guam.  During the conference, the chapter committed $2000 in support of the conference.  Looking at getting representation and participation on all critical WESTOP committees.  Len Woods is also active.  C-Vent concerns with reimbursement commitments and will speak with chapter about these costs.  Considering 501c3 status.  Have been working on connections with legislature.
• Southern Cal – Reviewed balance for chapter.  Some outstanding checks from the student leadership conference.  The PDS will take place at Pechanga Resort in Temecula, CA.  Upcoming SLC will be at CSU Channel Islands.  Chapter would like to raise funds to increase scholarships.
• Service Council Reports:
• Legislation & Education – Doing well with representation from all of the chapters in participating on committee.  Reviewed in detail the Reauthorization of HEA, which had tremendous bipartisan support.  The access, affordability, accountability, included are reforms in financial aid, text book costs more manageable, student/family education information, FAFSA down to 2 pages, importance of financial literacy.  Next steps, education department process.  Committee will be looking at this closely, especially the regulations.  These laws are now in effect, and SSS is involved in this transition/change.  Required services vs. permissible services for example.  Presentations being planned for all of the chapter PDS.  Will continue with the congressional updates.  Stephen Domingues would like to thank WESTOP because people do respond and follow-thru.  Question from Joy Brittain and asked Jose Martinez-Saldana about the evaluation and lawsuit.  Upcoming elections will bring a new set of chairs, etc. Is there a definition of a “disconnected” student (from Matt Benney), answer is that it will be sorted out during the regulatory process.  Definition could also possibly be located in comments section.
• Membership & Elections – Activity only included receiving of information on membership.  Revamped C-Vent, and will be sending out soon. And also drafted a 10 question optional survey to obtain data that can be used for inquiries from potential donors or supporters.  Members may be hesitant in filling out due to taking the time to do so, however hopeful that members will take the time to do this so WESTOP can be ready for donors who request this information.  Working with Joy Brittain on cleaning up C-Vent and lists of members names and cleaning up the duplicates.  Will be sending chapter presidents monthly a list of their paid members, on the first of the month.  Reminded chapter presidents that they should have president-elects ready for the upcoming conference for the elections process.  Would like all chapters to use standard new members orientation powerpoint presentation, which will be ready by October 1st via email.  New members handbook also needs to be revamped, with goal of November 1st and to be available in pdf for continuing/renewed members and hard copy for new members only.  BOD/SC had questions regarding the draft quests for the C-Vent survey for membership.  Goal was to make these questions available as optional to not delay or discourage a member from completing their membership registration.  Brian Aguilar/Anita Blanco were concerned that the questions were not gathering relevant data nor outcome data.  Howard had a concern that individuals who may be filling out the membership registration may not have that information to include to finish the registration process.  Questions were drafted with Joy Brittain, Gustavo Oceguera, and Jose Martinez-Saldana.  Jose Martinez-Saldana recommended that the survey be separate from the membership registration, and perhaps have a separate email for the survey and someone to make the calls to members to remind them to do this.  Gustavo Oceguera felt that it should be a research committee responsibility.  Questions will be pulled off for President’s review.
• Professional Development – Committee members who are currently listed are conference chairs.  There are 3 priorities for this committee – leadership development program, 09 annual conference, and chapter professional development/activities for new members that is consistent across chapters.  Activity timeline will be shared via email to committee members.  Would like to research other leadership development programs from fellow TRIO regions, as well as business organizations.  One conference chair, Susan Madrid-Simon, and Veronica Hernandez will be chairing other conference committees that involve local contacts in Arizona.  Board and conference chair to visit hotel site at board meeting in January 09.  Would like to have more regional representation on the conference committee – heavy now with SoCal and AZ and would like to involve more.  Considering a “new members” strand for any new WESTOP members more than the basic new members orientation.  Would like the Board to consider having the annual conference as the one hallmark event/focus for the year, instead of multiple focused activities that will stretch resources, additionally, allow one year for development of leadership institute to be sure that it is well thought out prior to implementation.  Action item suggests the rate looks at cost per participant plus a percent of income based on prior conference.  Silvester Mata commented that a leadership development program would be a great way to attract non-TRIO professionals to join and become involved in the organization.  Lydia Perez would like to use many non-TRIO facilitators for the institute, for example from GE or state government office.
• Public Relations – Committee priorities include work that has carried over from previous years.  Action items included a way to determine priorities.  Would like to have more time to re-prioritize the committee priorities.  Suggested to develop press packages for possible donors and others interested in WESTOP, including profiles of alumni, membership profiles, program profiles.  Development of an ally list, collect from each chapter.  Need to develop a cohesive “look” of WESTOP to include on publications, etc, and to re-enact the email newsletters.
• Resource Development – Committee assignments have not changed much (see detailed report), with the focus on fund development.  Also marketing materials/campaign for outside contributors.  Showed information and brochure on “EDvolution” as a possible contractor for marketing.  Committee will be working on 2 priorities due to the need to focus on funding.  California Roundtable has a list of prep programs through APPRIS, and WESTOP needs to have programs represented in this database.  PDS chairs will be contacted to reserve a conference workshop session for ACT and to formally invite them to participate.  Can increase non-TRIO participation.  On-line donations creation is being considered through change.org or google.com, but WESTOP website needs to be worked on.  Still seeking chapter representation to serve on the committee.
• Technology – no report.
• Research – vacant position.
• Financial Affairs:
• Reviewed priorities – revision of Financial Affairs manual, membership rates, and conference refunds.  Discussed current finances in WESTOP by amounts in accounts, monies coming in, and bills and/or reimbursements yet to be made.  Needs to revise recommendations, as they are actions.  Three chapters are loaning WESTOP $3000 to assist in offsetting current low balances in order to pay reimbursements to members not able to attend conference, and to pay upcoming bills.  A revised report will be completed August 22nd.  Gustavo Oceguera asked whether chapters would be willing to “give” WESTOP the $3000 opposed to it being a loan.  Arizona will have a discussion as to whether to loan, give, and/or increase the amount asked by WESTOP.  Additionally, discussion included that each chapters’ budget in reality is WESTOP’s budget.  If the WESTOP organization falls financially, all chapters’ budget will be absorbed by WESTOP.  Board should consider creating a by-law or procedure for addressing this type of problem if it would occur.  Len commented how WESTOP is a business, and needs to function like a business.  All chapters should be/have been contacted to obtain monies.
• Regarding membership rates, an incentive (non-punative) measure to have members pay dues early and receive the lower rate.
• Action Items:
• WESTOP to get a new logo – Motion for board to consider a redesign of the WESTOP logo, made by Michelle Scott, Gilbert Acuna second.  Discussion – marketing, could be a new logo for the conference, and could be introduced at the conference.  Recommend as we go forward to look at something that is transferable (easy to translate on all computer systems), and to also present drafts to provide to Board to review.  Will this incur a cost for graphic design?  Could be included in Public Relations budget.  Tomasa Mauricio and/or Michelle Scott may be able to obtain no-cost with staff member who does graphic design.  Question called by Howard Willis.  Motion passes.
• Membership rates – Motion that the membership rates for 2008/2009 be increased to 100 for individual membership and $500 for institutional membership with discounted rates of $80 for individual and $425 for institutional if paid before December 31st and $65 for indivudal and $350 for institutional if paid by September 30th, made by Howard Willis, second by Len Woods.  Friendly amendment by Joy Brittain that the student rate to be included, Len Woods agreed.  Motion passes.
• Unfinished Business:
• (presentation took place prior to the approval of minutes)  ACT Partnership – Presentation presented by Efren Mercado, Brian Aguilar, and Gustavo Oceguera.
• Overview of academic and college readiness tools available for pre-college programs from ACT; including an academic plan for UB students from program entry to graduation.
• New Business:
• Revamping website, and updating directory.
• Announcements:
• October 31st-November 1st next Board meeting in San Diego.
• Send electronic BOD reports to Secretary by August 22nd so that it can be posted to website, and SC reports to Michelle Scott.
• Adjournment – motion to adjourn by Joy Brittain, second by Gilbert Acuna.  Adjourned at 1:22pm.

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