The Financial Aid office is the first major department on campus to switch to e-mail and MetroConnect as its sole means of communication.

“The work completed for financial aid provides a roadmap for other college offices as they begin to make the move to paperless communications,” said Information Technology’s Rick Beck.

Financial Aid mails an average of 1,000 letters per week to students, with the number reaching 16,000-20,000 during peak periods. “Thanks to IT, the switch was fairly painless,” said Cindy Hejl, director of financial aid, adding that the most time-consuming part of the process was converting the office’s standard letters to an e-mail format. “Once we make sure that each message is ‘pretty,’ it will be a breeze each week,” she said.
In addition, the switch will save the office about $62,000 annually in postage, paper and printing of forms.

The office mailed more than 15,000 notifications to students informing them of the switch to e-mail communication and received only two complaints. “It is fairly new to students and I am sure that we will constantly review the process for the next few months,” Hejl said.

“Sending out the e-mails has proven to be very quick and this method is less stressful for our office to get multiple letters out for students in a timely fashion,” Hejl said.

The project team consisted of Cindy Hejl, Karla Nash, Michelle Leboo and Linda Siewert from Financial Aid, and Richard Newton (project manager) and Dave Yetter of Information Technology. In addition, several individuals provided special support: Bill Hathaway-Clark, Admissions; and Sharon McGee-Canady, Ed Jacobs and Nancy Burrows, Information Technology.