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DATE:     February 11, 2011                 

TO:           NASPA Colleagues and Foundation Donors

FROM:     Barbara Hancock Snyder, NASPA Foundation President

                 On behalf of the NASPA Foundation Board of Directors

I am writing today to provide an update from the perspective of the NASPA Foundation Board of Directors about the future of our Foundation and Association.    I want to assure you that we have been responsible stewards of the personal and/or corporate resources which you have pledged to NASPA, and we will continue to be.  We know many of you have questions about the issue of potential consolidation with ACPA and its impact on the Foundation and if we have been addressing this issue as your Board. 

Recently, the NASPA Foundation Executive Committee met to consider the issue of consolidation and the role of the NASPA Foundation in these conversations. Following this meeting, The Executive Committee polled the members of the Foundation Board of Directors regarding consolidation. While not unanimous, the majority of the Board was of the same opinion.

The Foundation Board is not opposed to one voice and one association for our profession.  We acknowledge those who have worked diligently to develop a proposal for consolidation of NASPA and ACPA, and we thank them for their work.   However, we do not believe that we are executing our fiduciary responsibility as the Foundation Board by supporting an initiative which will bring to an end the vibrant association which NASPA is and will continue to be.  The Foundation is forward thinking in every way. That is the reason we solicit your funds and support for future projects and research.  Like many of you, we feel consolidation conversation fatigue but we think that frustration will only grow stronger in the next 4 to 5 years as the best minds of the student affairs professionals spend countless hours in negotiating a workable organization instead of moving forward with enhanced collaborative programs for our students and for our professional colleagues. It makes no sense in these turbulent fiscal and political times to abandon a brand which is recognized and respected as the leading voice in Student Affairs.  NASPA has never been in a more robust, relevant or necessary leadership position than it is today.  And, given issues at the state and federal levels (and on our own campuses), discontinuing the NASPA brand could be detrimental in our lobbying efforts to speak as "the voice" for a very critically important educational profession and association.

By opposing the current consolidation initiative, we are working to move strategically and intentionally ahead toward an exciting future.  There is virtually nothing that a consolidated association with ACPA will accomplish that NASPA cannot do successfully on its own, while maintaining its well-established value and identity.  Indeed, the consolidation proposal which will inevitably serve as a road map to the future pays far too much homage to the structures of the past.  Furthermore, it

• diminishes strong regional representation on the national board
•  fragments geographic strengths
•  reduces or eliminates the voices of many constituent groups
•  forces its entire membership to attend one national conference which by size alone makes it divisive rather than inclusive.

The role of the NASPA Foundation in the new association is unknown, but our intent is to continue to follow our mission to support the causes which are critical to you, our valued members.  Consolidation, as presented currently, makes no sense.   Please take the time to become an informed voter and I am confident that you will choose NASPA as it stands now as the major voice for Student Affairs.