This post comes to us from student loan expert Heather Jarvis. YNPNers around the country have been relying on her eagle eye for advice and updates on the federal government’s student loan forgiveness program (which many nonprofit employees qualify for). We are grateful for her latest blog post- info that many of us have been waiting for! You can also find more information on the public service loan forgiveness program by checking out the list resources Heather has curated.

3 New Documents Everyone in Government and Nonprofit Services Needs Right Now

The Department of Education today released the long awaited Employment Certification for Public Service Loan Forgiveness form!  Woot!

Folks in government and 501(c)(3) nonprofit service* can finally get that warm and fuzzy feeling that will come from the government saying “yes” your employment qualifies and “yes” you made x number of payments that count towards forgiveness.

Why This Is Important 
Student loan borrowers can earn Public Service Loan Forgiveness by making 120 of the right kind of payments, on the right kind of loans, while working in the right kind of job*.  But you also have to PROVE that you met all the requirements of the program.  That’s where the paperwork comes in.  

Nothing about Public Service Loan Forgiveness is automatic.  Not one thing.  Student loan borrowers will need to jump through a whole lot of hoops to establish that they have earned the forgiveness.  Flaming hoops probably.  But student loan borrowers aren’t afraid of a little paperwork, right?  We say Bring. It. On.

If you think you are working for a qualifying public service employer and you’re working toward Public Service Loan Forgiveness, YOU NEED THIS FORM.  You love this form.  This form is your BFF. 

Run, don’t walk, and download these documents:
Instructions for Completing the Employment Certification for Public Service Loan Forgiveness form
Employment Certification for Public Service Loan Forgiveness form
Department of Education’s Letter to Borrowers about the process

Read it all.  Fill out your part and take the documents to your work.  Figure out who is authorized to sign for your employer and ask that person to fill out their part fully and carefully.  Make sure everything is totally filled in and then submit the form to:

FedLoan Servicing
P.O. Box 69184
Harrisburg, PA 17106-9184

Or Fax to 717-720-1628

Do this every year and whenever you change jobs.  Keep copies of your W-2s and paystubs, and whatever else you think documents your employment or supports your employer’s eligibility.  Keep this stuff until the end of time.  Forever.  And then keep it some more.  I recommend the paranoid method of record keeping in this case.

For help with the form call FedLoan Servicing:  855-265-4038

More from the Department of Education:  www.studentaid.ed.gov/publicservice
More details and opportunity to ask Heather during upcoming Free Public Service Loan Forgiveness Webinars.

*Note for all clergy, rabbis, priests, imams, preachers, pastors, ayatollahs, and others: New language included in these forms indicates the Department of Education is taking the position that an individual borrower’s employment does not qualify when the borrower is employed in a nonprofit organization and their job duties are related to religious instruction, worship services, or any form of proselytizing. Heather will post more analysis and information about this recent development ASAP.

Check out Heather Jarvis’ blog at askheatherjarvis.com for more timely, helpful information on the public service student loan forgiveness program.

They discussed the recent YNPN report Good in Theory Problems in Practice: Young professionals’ views on popular leadership development strategies. The interview provides a great overview of the findings, what was surprising in the findings, and what the findings are saying about the future leadership of the nonprofit sector.

• Listen now! Hear the podcast through the GrantSpace multimedia archive.

YNPNdc will be tweeting live from the White House tonight, during and after the President’s speech. The White House has asked us to encourage all YNPN chapters across the country to participate in this event as well. During the speech you can engage with YNPNdc through their Twitter account @YNPNdc and with the White House via @WhiteHouse & @JonCarson44. Immediately following the speech, pose your questions to a live panel of White House senior advisers by using the hashtag #SOTU. Be sure to include @ynpndc in your message. You can also post questions via the White House’s Facebook page.  For more information or to view an enhanced version of the State of the Union address and the live streamed follow up Q&A please visit WhiteHouse.gov

The White House is excited about the work YNPN is doing and this is a great opportunity for chapters across the country to engage on a national stage.  We encourage everyone to participate in tonight’s event.

Links and Hashtags:

• White House: www.whitehouse.gov
• White House SOTU page: http://www.whitehouse.gov/state-of-the-union-2012
• White House Twitter: @WhiteHouse, @JonCarson44
• White House Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WhiteHouse
• YNPNdc Twitter: @YNPNdc
• Hashtags: #SOTU, #YNPNdc, #YNPN

We are certainly excited for the upcoming year as YNPN celebrates its fifteenth anniversary!

Excerpt from the article:

A new face for young nonprofit employees

The 15-year-old Young Nonprofit Professionals Network has hired its first director and full-time employee—Trish Tchume, formerly of the Building Movement Project, a nonprofit that works to strengthen social-change groups.

Read more at Philanthropy.com

This post comes to us from the Director of YNP

A few years ago I became really fascinated with the AIGA Symbol Signs.  I’m not sure what first caught my interest about them but it probably had something to do with their connection to other things I tend to be drawn to – shared meaning, simple ways of stating the complex, or pretty pictures .

I love the idea that, because of simple human ingenuity, a Tagalog-only speaker who falls ill as she makes her way through the Denver airport would know from the white cross on a dark background in front of her that help is close by.

I’ve been involved with YNPN for several years now but my first couple of months as director of YNPN – especially my time on the road – has crystallized for me how important it is for even the most savvy among us to have clear, identifiable ways of finding and accessing what we need.  It’s clear to me that YNPN has grown to be that for many young nonprofit professionals as well as those seeking to become young nonprofit professionals.  Here’s how I know…

At this point in my directorship, I’ve spent time with chapters in Phoenix, Chicago, DC, San Francisco (twice), and at home in NYC.  In each of these places I’ve met YNPNers who’ve shared more or less the same story.  It goes something like this:

I was working for [insert small nonprofit] in [insert city/town/hamlet] and I didn’t really know anybody else in the sector there.  So I heard about YNPN and I started going to events.  I moved to [insert city/town/hamlet where we are having current conversation] a few months ago to work for [insert new small nonprofit] and I didn’t really know anyone in the sector here – but I knew about YNPN!  So I started coming to YNPN events here and now I have a community.

I’ve probably had this conversation 6 times in the past 3 months and, as dorky as it sounds, I still get chills.  I love, love, love that this beautiful little idea that a few young nonprofiteers  dreamed up around a CompassPoint conference table 15 years ago – this little idea that so many of you have grabbed onto and nurtured in your own communities – has become the symbol sign for “inroad to my local nonprofit community” for tens of thousands of young people who want to commit themselves to change wherever they land.

As you all may have noticed over the past several years (and especially over the last 12 months) the world is finally waking up to the notion that the world’s most pressing problems are too widespread, too complex to be solved by any one person, party, organization or nation.  At the same time the world is waking up to the fact that the most vibrant ideas for how to build a better world also don’t live in any one person or company or organization or government – the best ideas live amongst the people.  And those ideas emerge when you create a framework and then allow people to bring their best selves to it.  We’ve seen that everywhere from campaign house parties to the iPhone app store to Wikipedia to the Occupy Everywhere movement.  And we certainly see it in the work you do as chapters of YNPN.

That alone would get me out of bed every morning to do what I can to strengthen this national network, but the conversations that YNPN has been invited to be a part of over the past several months have reminded me that, as a network, we have an even bigger role to play.

For example, on November 15, YNPN was invited to be one of the 200 government, nonprofit and philanthropic institutions to participate in the White House Forum on Nonprofit Leadership. YNPN was fortunate enough to be at the table during the White House forum to think through what these different mechanisms might look like. There were a number of recommendations that emerged from the groups which will become the framework for the Initiative for Nonprofit Talent and Leadership (click here to learn more about how YOU can become involved with this initiative!) Time and again however the refrain arose: “We need on-ramps and training opportunities for the diverse array of professional emerging in the sector. We need opportunities for them to network and build connections in the field.”  It drove home for me yet again what a vital role YNPN is already playing in advancing the sector and how well-positioned we are to play this vital role for an even greater number and more diverse set of change agents.

But how do we take our work to scale while maintaining the grassroots, people-powered ethos of the network that attracted so many of us?  We have some of the answers – stronger technological infrastructure, a more robust communications strategy, clearer channels between national and amongst the chapters so that resources can be shared more readily…But what else?  How do we make sure that the best ideas from all of you are harvested?  How do we make sure that YNPN becomes the symbol sign for an even broader, more diverse array of  young people looking to make change via the social sector?

I couldn’t be more excited for what we’ll build together.