Acacia Fraternity Foundation Directors 2012 - 2015

Please refer to the following list of bios for those alumni brothers nominated to serve as Acacia Fraternity Foundation Directors for 2012 - 2015. 


To vote in the AFF Proxy Vote process, click on the following link to complete the online survey. 

John C. (Chip) Brueckman III

Cornell ’76. His career has been in marketing for Proctor and Gamble, Seven Up, Cadbury-Schweppes and most recently for the company that oversees the Texas state lottery. Sales, Merchandising, and Business Development Manager at GTECH, Inc. Resides in Plano, TX

Bryan W. Dowd

Morningside College ’02.  Treasurer of the Morningside Chapter 2002-2003.  Alumni Representative (Morningside College) for 2008 & 2010 Conclaves.  Currently Vice President of Commercial Banking & Treasury Management for First American Bank.  Resides in Fort Myers, FL.

Brian R. Durst

Wisconsin ’87.  Order of Pythagoras.  Current Vice President and Past President, Acacia Housing Corp of Wisconsin Chapter.  Founding Father, Wisconsin Chapter.   District Sales Manager, American Family Insurance.   Resides in Woodstock (Atlanta), GA.  

Amos D. Meyers, Jr.

Shippensburg ’66.  Founding member of Shippensburg chapter.  Member of the Acacia Fraternity Foundation Board of Directors, serving as chairman of the AFF Scholarship Committee.  Elementary classroom teacher and administrator (retired). Chairman, Hawaii County Transportation Commission.  Resides in Volcano, Hawaii.

Melvin W. (Mel) Rapp

Illinois ’49. Order of Pythagoras, Award of Merit.  Member of the Acacia Fraternity Foundation Board of Directors.  Managing director of Quality Chekd Dairies (retired).  Treasurer, Illinois Chapter House Corporation and Illinois Capital Campaign Committee.  Co-Chapter Advisor, Illinois chapter.  Resides in Wheaton, Illinois.

William M. (Bill) Riley, Jr.
Kansas State '60. Order of Pythagoras, Award of Merit. Currently serving as President of the Acacia Fraternity Foundation Board of Directors. President of The Pathfinder, Inc., retail outdoor clothing and equipment. Chairman of the National Trustee Council of the Nature Conservancy, Chairman of Colorado Association of Fund Raisers, CFRE, Board of Trustees Kansas United Methodist Foundation. Past president of Kansas 4-H Foundation and the Kansas State chapter alumni board. Resides in Manhattan, KS.

Richard S. (Rick) Rasmussen

California ’80. Order of Pythagoras.  Member of the Acacia Fraternity Foundation Board of Directors.  Director and Vice President of California Chapter House Corporation since 1982.  Venture Capital investor and member of Sand Hill Angels.  Silicon Valley trade commissioner for the Consulate General of Canada.  Former marketing vice president and general manager for C-Cube Microsystems, LSI Logic and other technology firms. Resides in San Jose, California.

Larry E. Schroeder

Georgia ’77. Order of Pythagoras, Award of Merit, George F. Patterson Award. Currently serving as Treasurer, Acacia Fraternity Foundation.  Software consultant, IBM DB2 Content Management.  Msonic Lodge, 32nd degree.  Resides in Cary, North Carolina.

Dewayne E. (Dewey) Ullsperger

Nebraska ’82. Order of Pythagoras, Award of Merit, George F. Patterson Award.  Vice president and chief actuary, United Healthcare.  Co-chair of the AFF New Century Campaign.  Currently serving as Vice-President, Acacia Fraternity Foundation.  Resides in Minnetonka, Minnesota.

William A.(Bill) Utic

Cornell, ‘74.  Order of Pythagoras, Award of Merit, George F. Patterson Award. Past President, Secretary/Treasurer of Acacia Fraternity Foundation and current member of Acacia Fraternity Foundation Board of Directors.  Past President, Director, California Chapter House Corporation; Presently, Manager of Corporate Real Estate for San Francisco-based Pacific Gas and Electric Company.  Resides in Fremont, California.

ChapterSpot / ACACIAconnect Demo Videos

In an effort to continue to provide relevant educational materials to our chapters, the team at ChapterSpot has hired another member that will be totally focused on educating chapters that have signed up for the service, which of course includes all Acacia Fraternity Chapters.

The videos, accessible at the link below, were created with a general ChapterSpot account, so it will not look exactly like ACACIAconnect, but it is very similar.

Communications Web Video: http://www.screenr.com/8ys8

Dues Part 1: http://www.screenr.com/GNT8

Dues Part 2: http://www.screenr.com/FNT8

Dues Part 3: http://www.screenr.com/TMT8

Events: http://www.screenr.com/3Vs8

Reports: http://www.screenr.com/fVs8

Docushare: http://www.screenr.com/59s8

Polls and Surveys: http://www.screenr.com/J9s8

Links specific to ACACIAconnect:
MyCornerstones function on ACACIAconnect: http://youtu.be/v07R6dmy-Ec
Service Hours function on ACACIAconnect: http://youtu.be/Jsdn0-ObLpo

Please let Acacia Headquarters know if there are any other videos that would be helpful for you in learning about and demonstrating ACACIAconnect by emailing to cornerstones@acacia.org.

ACACIAconnect Financial Features

Dues Processing & Merchant Account -

There have been a few points of confusion related to this service during fall 2011. This post will clear up those points.

This aspect of the service is different from the others in that the rest of the features are available for free through your chapter’s affiliation with Acacia International Fraternity, whereas there are some costs involved with the Dues Processing Service. Here is a link to ChapterSpot page regarding finances.

Here is a video that demonstrates how to Link Your Chapter Bank Account to ACACIAconnect.

Please note:

1. this part of the service is NOT mandatory or required - if your chapter is using a service that you are happy with, you can continue to use that service, or you may consider using this service
2. your chapter CAN use the other features of ACACIAconnect without using the Dues Processing service

ACACIA Fraternity Headquarters recommends that your chapter:

• weigh all reasonable & expedient options and choose what works best for your members
• at least setup the Merchant Account to link to chapter bank account & setup a donation goal that your alumni members or parents can support

Regarding Credit Card Processing

Here is a pdf that outlines the costs for processing payments via credit card.

In an email from Joe McMenamon, Director of Business Operations, he informed me of the following points:

“Our Credit Card Processing fees are very straight forward. For chapters that collect payments online there will be a set 3.89% and $0.35 fee removed from each payment collected. These fees include the Visa/MasterCard fees and Corduro’s card processing fees so there are no extra fees other then what is listed below (on the pdf link above).

In addition to the per transaction fees there are a few per occurrence fees listed below. The $25 fee for each chargeback and ACH Reject fee usually draws the most questions. These occur infrequently, but we recommend that these fees be passed through to the member in these occurrences. Please let me know if you have any further questions.”

In addition, there are a few other points to be clarified:

1) Confusion about a fee that Joe McMenamon mentioned at ALA.

• He did NOT say that Acacia Chapters would have the 35 cent per transaction fee waived
• He DID say the $5.00 per month fee for using Dues Payment service would be waived.
• Joe wanted me to reiterate that "if you sign up for the Dues Payment service, even if you don't use it, your chapter will not get charged the $5 per month fee."

2) ChapterSpot encourages you to setup your Merchant Account, even if you're not using the Dues Payment service for all of your financial transactions. Here is a list of benefits to completing the Merchant Application and linking it to a chapter bank account:

• collections for merchandise can be facilitated by the Merchant Account (i.e. tshirts, hoodies, anything that the chapter orders on behalf of its members)
• ability to use the Donation Goal function to collect donations from alumni or parents for any fundraising drives
• If you do use the Dues Payment feature, you are eliminating the relevance of the following excuses for members not getting their dues paid:
• "I don't have my checkbook so I can't make payment...", or "My parents are paying for me so I don't know when they will cut the check...", or "I would pay but I don't know how much I owe..."

3) ChapterSpot does want to make you aware of one difference from some of the competing services that are available:

• if you use the Dues Payment feature on ACACIAconnect to track or document a payment made via check or cash (as opposed to using the online payment feature at ACACIAconnect), the chapter keeps 100% of those payments; in other words: if a member doesn't use the credit card processing system to make the payment, then neither the member or the chapter pays the credit card processing or transaction fee; a chapter member with Finance Admin controls simply updates the amount of dues still owed for that member
• this is different from some of their competition, in that if you collect cash or check (even without using the online payment option), some services charge you a fee regardless

Link to ChapterSpot page regarding finances: https://www.chapterspot.com/finances.htm