by Mark Sklarow, Executive Director, Independent Educational Consultants Association

Our spring conference registration opened less than a week ago, and registration is already approaching 250. Early bird discounts end THIS FRIDAY (February 26), so if you are planning to attend our gathering in Toronto (May 12-15), get your registration completed right away. Full details on the conference are posted on the IECA Web site (http://www.iecaonline.com/conferences.html) and additional information, including details on all breakout sessions, will be added to the site in the next few days.

I have gotten a few questions and welcome this opportunity to clarify:

“I really don’t work with Canadian schools or universities (or ‘We don’t really get any students from Canada’). So maybe there won’t be as much for me at this conference.” Hold on!  Just because we are meeting in Canada for the first time doesn’t mean our focus is shifting. Of the first 225 registrants, just 15 are Canadian consultants, schools, or universities. The other 210 are from the U.S. What we expect is full participation by our IECA members from across the U.S. with a bit of an uptick in non-U.S. participation, reflecting how much easier it is for consultants in Asia, South America, and Europe to travel to Canada. We expect all of the schools, colleges, and programs that typically attend IECA conferences to be joining us in Toronto, but with the added bonus of greater participation by Canadian institutions. Remember, school, program, and college representatives from Nova Scotia to Vancouver helped us plan the conference!

“There’s so much going on before and after the conference, I’m still trying to figure out what to do, so I can’t register yet.” Wait a minute! We don’t want you to lose out on the early bird discount. Register for the conference now and get your discount. You can always sign back on using our Web-based registration system and modify your registration. That way you won’t miss the discount. We know there’s a lot going on: pre-conference activities include IECA tours of Ontario universities; special tours of Ontario boarding school and gap year programs; the popular Speed Meetings—actually two of them: one for traditional boarding schools and the other for therapeutic programs; and a pre-conference workshop on LD issues as well as one on Web-based marketing. Whew!! Post-conference activities include TWO different college tours: one of universities in upstate New York and the other in Nova Scotia. There’s a school tour in Nova Scotia as well.

“I just got a conference/tour price list via e-mail and it looks like the prices really went up.” NO! That was an e-mail from some other association! Don’t be confused. The cost of our three-day college tours (pre- or post-conference) is still just $95—not the $200 the other group charges. Our conference fee for members, including meals and special events and even including a pre-conference workshop, is unchanged at $395 ($370 early bird)—not the $595 the other group just e-mailed for their conference and pre-conference registration. IECA works hard to keep our costs as low as possible (with thanks to our conference sponsors). As proof: our membership dues have not changed in 30 years! Finally, even non-members can save a bundle. Our conference and pre-conference workshop full registration for non-member consultants is $530—not the $745 others are charging, according to that e-mail. Of course, cost is just part of the story. We are confident that everyone will get a great deal out of participating in the IECA conference: amazing speakers, great educational sessions, and lots of opportunities for networking.

by Mark Sklarow, Executive Director, IECA, from the National Conference in NC

Here we are on the eve of the 2009 Fall Conference. Even before we officially open the gathering at 1:00 pm on Wednesday, we will have completed visits to more than 15 campuses by over 140 consultants, 130 attendees will have taken part in pre-conference seminars on financial aid, LD assessments, and customer service. About 60 participants will have joined in the first-ever IECA speed meetings and several groups, including Strategic Planning, Executive Board and the AICEP Board will have met.

Sound like a lot, considering the conference will not have been officially opened? Well, there’s more: 35 vendors will have been engaging arrivals in “Conference Central”;  Our IECA team will be providing information on a number of new member services and offering one-to-one assistance with social media;  AdmissionsQuest, in coordination with IECA, will have already begun its webcasting, blogging, tweeting, and more. All this after the staff prepared for months, and created what became more than 100 cases (!) of materials to be used in the days to come.

And how about more—all still in pre-conference mode! Some 140 IECA members will have attended an early arrivals dinner at Johnson & Wales University. There, all aspects of the program, from menu design, to food prep, to serving, to demonstration were created by culinary students. Other events, hosted by our Outreach Committee, invited very early arrivals to gather together for meals.

If that sounds exhausting consider that once we open the conference, more than 115 speakers and presenters will take part, including some international leaders in education theory. There will be 275 colleges and schools represented in our Thursday fair and another 215 programs for adolescents in our Friday Swap. New affinity groups representing tech-savvy members and international consultants will join our ever-expanding pool of meetings, gatherings and events.

Well over 1,100 attendees will take part in the conference and we hope each leaves with a personal sense that it was of great value to them. Putting on such a conference takes enormous effort, starting with our North and South Carolina members who served on the local host committee, our Board and Committee leaders who jumped in to help plan and execute, the consultants and schools who decided to take a chance on the Speeds Meetings or showcases, and the hundreds who signed up to be part of our first end-of-conference Master Class.

Yet much of the effort falls on the IECA staff. Most national organizations would have a staff of 4 – 8 working exclusively on such a conference. For us, it’s everyone in every department joining in to make it work. IECA has the best staff of any small association in the country. They work together to accomplish far more than organizations three or four times the size. Those in NC this week will see what they’ve accomplished. Be sure to thank them!

Have a great conference!

by Janice Berger, Manager of Member Services, IECA

Excitement is brewing as everyone looks forward to the pre-conference college, school, and program tours. The response to registration has been exceptional—we were thrilled to have been able to set up a second set of college tours.

We thank each institution that has graciously opened their campuses to IECA consultants in the pursuit of direct knowledge not only at pre-conference time, but also for providing tours throughout the year! These tours provide IECA members with invaluable insight into the school or college, which they can then share with their clients.

On another note, I have been getting quite a few calls from those who attended the IECA Summer Training Institute (STI)—they tell me how energized they have been from the week at Swarthmore and are asking lots of questions about membership.

One thing that struck me is how some of the STI participants mentioned that they have already been in touch with IECA members and how gracious and generous our members have been in offering their time to someone making the transition to private practice. Some of this mentoring comes so naturally to our members that they may not even realize how much of a difference they make. We’re here to tell you, you bet it does! Offering your time to someone can set those newer to the field off to a solid start, create confidence and a feeling of connectedness to IECA colleagues and IECA as an association. We know that our members are collegial, but it is always nice for you to hear how much you are appreciated. You as a mentor play a large part in perpetuating ethics in the field and a lot more. Wait, this is probably a great moment to plug the IECA Mentoring Program, don’t forget to ask me about it…

Among the many benefits an educational consultant brings to a student in their school or college search is direct knowledge from having visited scores of campuses, conducting evaluative visits. Such visits give Independent Educational Consultant Association members an eye-witness, ear-to-the-ground, personal way of understanding what makes a campus tick: its social and academic balance, the relationship between faculty and students, emotional support or sense of competition among classmates, the campus-wide support for the arts, the political climate, religious tolerance, acceptance of and offerings to students with learning disabilities, relationship with the local community, among hundreds of other factors.

Only by walking through a campus, reading the student paper, scanning the bulletin boards, talking with students, observing the dining hall, can you begin to get a real feel for a school that no guidebook, Web site or blog (even this one) can accurately describe. That’s why many IECA members can count 200 or more campus visits among their background work to better serve clients and families. Of course, every consultant supplements these tours with student surveys, books, conversations with IECA colleagues and much more. But nothing replaces the value of walking in the path of a student.

This is the primary reason we commit so many resources to making our campus tours a central part of what we offer our members. Members often tell us of the great value in touring campuses with other educational consultants: sharing insights, raising questions, etc.

As we look ahead to our fall conference in Charlotte, North Carolina, we know that our Special Needs and Schools committees will soon be announcing special campus tours. The college tours are now set and include campus visits and presentations at:

Monday November 9:
High Point University, Elon University and Wake Forest University;

Tuesday November 10:
Davidson College, UNC-Charlotte and Queens University of Charlotte;

Wednesday November 11:
Wingate University and the IECA conference kicks off at 1:00 p.m.

Registration for these tours begins in August, along with the IECA Conference registration.Details on the school and special needs tours will be announced soon.

Posted by Mark Sklarow, IECA Executive Director