Shining a Light on Financial Aid Careers: An Interview with Zack Goodwin on NASFAA’s Career Awareness Toolkit
As financial aid offices across the country continue to grapple with staffing shortages and limited visibility on campus, NASFAA’s Career Awareness Toolkit is helping institutions take a proactive approach to promoting financial aid as a meaningful and rewarding profession. To shed light on the toolkit’s creation and its potential to inspire the next generation of aid professionals, NASFAA spoke with Zack Goodwin, chair of the Career Awareness Task Force and a longtime advocate for strengthening the financial aid pipeline.
Like many in the field, Goodwin didn’t set out to work in financial aid. “I took what I thought would be a short-term job to pay the bills,” he said. “I had no idea how well it would fit me – or how fulfilling it would be.” Thirty years later, Goodwin has held roles across multiple sectors of higher education, government, and adjacent fields like admissions. Along the way, one challenge has persisted: getting others to understand the importance of financial aid and the value of those who work in it.
“Too often, people outside the profession don’t fully see the meaning and impact of what we do,” Goodwin said. “That lack of understanding makes it difficult to attract and retain staff. We needed tools that both inspire and inform.”
The Career Awareness Toolkit was designed by keeping that impact in mind and putting the importance of the profession front and center. Built by a diverse task force of financial aid professionals, the toolkit provides customizable resources to help campus aid offices connect with key stakeholders – from senior leadership and HR teams to students and potential job seekers.
A Strategic, Collaborative Approach
To identify the most influential audiences and resources, the task force used a two-pronged strategy: identifying where career decisions are made and which campus partners could best amplify the message.
“We focused on executive leadership, human resources and career services, and current students and student employees,” Goodwin said. “The group then split into sub-teams to develop tools tailored to each audience.”
The resulting materials include tailored email templates, presentation slides, one-pagers, and conversation guides that aid professionals can use to raise awareness and build support. For executive leadership, the toolkit offers sample messaging that ties financial aid to institutional priorities like enrollment management, compliance, and student success. For HR teams, resources highlight the complexity of financial aid roles and underscore the need for professional development and competitive compensation.
The toolkit also includes customizable resources to engage students and career seekers, helping them visualize pathways into and through the profession.
Creating Clarity for Career Seekers
Recognizing that many people are unfamiliar with what a financial aid career actually entails, the toolkit also includes visual and easy-to-digest materials designed for students or early-career professionals. “We considered the questions someone might ask: What does a day in the life look like? What skills are needed? How do I grow?” Goodwin explained. “Our goal was to help them literally ‘picture’ themselves in this work.”
Maximizing Toolkit Impact
Goodwin encourages institutions to use the toolkit wherever possible, including in unexpected places. “Almost everything in the toolkit is designed to be personalizable or easily duplicated,” he said. “It can be used on campus, at career fairs, or even at external conferences where aid professionals may be interacting with broader higher education audiences.”
Just as importantly, he encourages offices to stay visible, both in how they engage stakeholders outside the office and in how they support growth from within. “Find opportunities to connect, use the toolkit, and make sure others on campus understand the full scope of what you do,” he said. “And be just as intentional about mentoring and developing your own staff.”
Looking Ahead
Goodwin sees the toolkit not as an endpoint, but a beginning. “This project demonstrates how we can come together as a profession to tell our story—and that work is far from finished,” he said. “We’re living through a complex and politically charged time in higher education. Financial aid professionals have always adapted and led through uncertainty, and now is our chance to help others see that, too.”
By sharing these resources and raising the profile of the profession, Goodwin and the task force hope to ensure that financial aid continues to attract passionate, skilled professionals for generations to come.
*This article was written with the assistance of generative AI, 2025.
Publication Date: 7/15/2025
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