AFSA Committee on Education

Overview of the AFSA Committee on Education (COE)

The AFSA Committee on Education oversees the administration of the AFSA Scholarship Program. This includes the AFSA Academic Merit and Art Merit Awards Program bestowed in the spring and the Financial Aid Awards Program bestowed in the fall to Foreign Service dependents. The Committee also determines the Scholarship Program's policies, reviews the performance of its $4.9 million endowment, provides guidance on fund-raising and other scholarship issues, and monitors the Scholarship Program budget.

Merit awards of $1500 are made to high school seniors based on their academic and artistic accomplishments via an annual competition. The Financial Aid Awards for undergraduate college study are need based and help to offset college costs. These scholarships range from $1,000 to $3,500. Each year approximately $27,000 in Merit Awards are made to approximately 22 students and $130,000 in Financial Aid Scholarship are made to approximately 55 students.

The Committee usually meets every 3-4 months except in March and April, when it meets in person (or via) email monthly. Much of the committee's work is done via email. Meetings are at AFSA headquarters (2101 E Street NW, Washington, DC) during lunch and generally last one hour.

Committee membership is comprised of a chairman (who is usually a retired Ambassador with an interest in Education although does not have to be), two representatives from the Department of State, and 1 representative from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and ideally 1 representative from Foreign Agriculture Service, or 1 representative from the Commercial Service or 1 representative International Broadcasting Bureau. A Diplomatic and Consular Officers, Retired (DACOR) liaison is appointed to with the AFSA Scholarship Director/COE on determining the DACOR Financial Aid Scholarship recipients.

While serving on the Committee, dependents of committee members are not eligible to receive any AFSA scholarship awards. Please contact Lori Dec at AFSA for more information at 202-944-5504 (phone), 202-338-6820 (fax) or dec@afsa.org (email).