Rhonda L. Smith

admin Consultant

Rhonda has 23 years of experience in the higher education industry. She started her career as an academic advisor and moved into financial aid in 2003. Starting as a financial aid coordinator, Rhonda has served in many roles within financial aid offices, including Director of Financial Aid and Corporate Director of Student Finance. Rhonda’s experience spans all the key areas of financial aid such as disbursement and refund processing, various Title IV programs including:

Read more

Pell Grant, Direct Loan and Federal Work-Study, recertification, maintaining policies and procedures manuals, compliance, verification, professional judgment, Veterans benefits and Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP). She has worked closely with school presidents, registrars and deans of academic affairs to ensure consistency and compliance across academic and financial aid processes. Maintaining strong professional relationships is one of the keys to Rhonda’s success in the financial aid industry.

She is proficient in Ed Express, EdConnect, COD, G5, NSLDS, PeopleSoft, CampusVue, MVS – cicsprod, C2K and various other student database.

Rhonda has a B.S. in Business and M.A. in Communications both from Northern Illinois University. She lives in Chicago and enjoys cycling and kickboxing.

^