Three members of the Associated Students were elected to the board of directors of a national student lobbying group last month.

The National Association of Students for Higher Education is an organization that lobbies Congress on issues of federal higher education, particularly financial aid. Arizona's three state universities and the Arizona Students' Association are members of N ASHE.

A united national organization is important for a state like Arizona, which receives 85 percent of its student aid money from the federal government, said Paul Allvin, co-founder of the organization and former executive director of ASA.

"You can't influence Congress with a single-state organization," Allvin said.

In a NASHE conference held in Washington, D.C., Oct. 18 through 20, ASUA President Rhonda Wilson was elected finance chair, one of six positions on NASHE's executive board.

"I keep the books for the organization. I will be creating the annual budget, issuing checks, filing taxes, collecting membership dues and handling fund raising," Wilson said.

Berry Melfy, ASA director for the UA, was elected the internal affairs director, which is also a position on the executive board.

Melfy will disseminate information throughout the organization and help plan conferences and also help the regional directors in recruitment," she said.

Melfy was also on the committee that rewrote NAHSE's constitution and restructured the young organization during the three-day conference.

"It was one of the most effective experiences I've had in student government. Fifteen people from across the country came together. I can't believe we actually got it done," she said.

One of the changes the group made was to mandate that the spring conference be held in Washington, D.C., while the fall conference will be held at a host school.

"In the fall we'll form the legislative agenda and educate everyone about NASHE. In the spring we will be a completely united front and Congress will be in session," Melfy said.

Jeff Schrade, ASA Task Force student lobbyist, was elected as the director for the Rocky Mountain region. He acts as a link between NASHE's executive board and the schools in his region and handles the recruitment of other schools in the Rocky Mountain ar ea.

"Recruitment was a big thing that I was interested in and also the dissemination of information. The Web is an incredible resource at no cost. We need to update our Web page. I want a Web page for each regional district linked off the national page," Schr ade said.

One issue NASHE is concerned with is reauthorization. Every five years, Congress must reauthorize its commitment to student financial aid, grants and loans.

"NASHE plays a role in upkeeping the amount of student aid funding on the national level. Without these organizations, the legislature would not see it as a priority," Wilson said.

NASHE plans to hire a person this year to go to congressional committee hearings and speak on its behalf . This person will do a lot of the daily tracking and send information out to the schools, Wilson said. This allows for a collective effort and shows that schools across the nation feel the same way, she said.

The conference this fall was NASHE's third, and the organization is still in the forming stages, Schrade said.

"We still have links to Allvin. He will be a great resource. It's also nice to talk to your founding father," he said.

"It also will be very convenient to be in the same place as the internal affairs director," Schrade said.

Allvin agreed. "Arizona was the driving force in getting NASHE going. The business end of NASHE is run out of Arizona. I feel really good that there is Arizona leadership," he said. Allvin works for the Make-A-Wish Foundation's national office in Phoenix.

Allvin and a former student body president of the University of Texas-Austin co-founded NASHE in March 1995 at a national student conference in Fairfax, Va.

"Arizona was looking for a truly nonpartisan group that focused on higher education," he said. ASA had just left the United States Students' Association because it had become a very partisan group.

But there were no groups around that offered what ASA was looking for, he said.

The first NASHE conference took place in October 1995.

"We passed a policy platform that says we're not going to accept any cuts in student aid," he said.

The second conference took place in Phoenix in March.

"It's been a matter now of growing the membership and maturing the organization, such as applying for federal grants," he said.

NASHE is studying the financial aid to formulate its stance for this year, Schrade said. There is an executive board meeting planned in Phoenix over the Thanksgiving break, he said.

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