NYIB Logo

NYIB 2007 Chairman's Report

Submitted by John Faries at the Annual Conference

It is with great excitement that I compose the Chairman’s Report this year. Excitement for what the National Youth Involvement Board has accomplished during the past 12 months, and excitement for the future of this outstanding organization.

I am truly honored to have had the opportunity to lead NYIB this year and see the tremendous advances being made across the country in the area of financial literacy. Starting as a grassroots organization in 1972 and growing to more than 1,000 active participants in the Network today, the NYIB has generated incredible momentum on which we must continue to build.

This growing importance of financial education was reinforced when the Credit Union National Association (CUNA) established a Financial Literacy Task Force in March, to which I was appointed by CUNA Chairman Allan Kemp McMorris. The task force envisions t hat all credit unions will place financial literacy among their top priorities and “provide active, measurable and ongoing personal financial education for credit union members and in credit union communities.” As this task force works to develop financial literacy guidelines for credit unions and showcase best practices, I welcome your input.

It has been a busy year for your NYIB Executive Committee. We began the year with a two-day intensive strategic planning session, where we adopted a strategic business plan that measures success based upon accomplished goals. The Executive Committee used this plan to guide NYIB during the year, ensuring the continued growth and sustainability of the organization for the future.

During the strategic planning session, we focused on finding added ways to serve as a resource to the NYIB Network and to further the organization’s reach within the credit union movement. A few of the highlights are included below.

• We enhanced the NYIB web site (www.nyib.org), adding the new document sharing program. With this program, members of the Network now have the ability to share best practices with one another in a centralized location.

• We hired an outside marketing firm – Visions, Ink. – to assist in the promotion of the annual conference and the NYIB as a whole. This valuable addition to the team will help to increase awareness of NYIB and grow the organization, which will allow us to bring more resources to the Network and continually increase the level of services that we provide.

• We revised the NYIB mission statement to have a dual focus, which has also been represented in our annual conference. NYIB has honed in on helping young people become financially-savvy individuals as well as loyal credit union members.

An excellent tool to fulfill this mission is the National Endowment for Financial Education’s (NEFE’s) High School Financial Planning Program (HSFPP). NEFE released an all-new version of this curriculum in April, with orders already exceeding 500,000 in 2007. What an amazing surge of activity!

During this year’s Governmental Affairs Conference in Washington , D.C. , members of the NYIB Executive Committee had the opportunity to speak with NCUA Chairman JoAnn Johnson, U.S. Treasury Deputy Assistant Secretary for Financial Education Dan Iannicola, Jr., Congress’s Financial Literacy & Economic Commission, and representatives from CUNA. All of these major players have a vested interest in financial education and are encouraged by the good works being done by credit unions around the country.

The NYIB is becoming an increasingly valuable resource to those outside of the NYIB Network, including state leagues and CUNA. By tracking and supplying your reported presentation data, these groups can use actual numbers when lobbying on behalf of financial literacy. I encourage each of you to continue reporting your financial literacy efforts to NYIB. I can promise you that your hard work does not go unnoticed.

I would like to take the opportunity to sincerely thank the organizations that have supported us this year, including our sponsors – CUNA, CUSucceed, Subcat Marketing, Randolph Brooks Federal Credit Union, Texas Dow Employees Credit Union and the Texas Credit Union Foundation – and vendors – brass|MEDIA Inc., CUNA Mutual Group, Marketing Partners, PAYjr, Snigglezoo Entertainment, and Visions, Ink.

Last but not least, I would like to thank the members of the NYIB Executive Committee. These individuals are amazing professionals who volunteer their time and energy to further the NYIB’s cause, and each is dedicated to the advancement of youth financial literacy.

I am extremely proud to be your Chairman and look forward to being part on the continued evolution of the National Youth Involvement Board Network.

John Faries
Chairman