Real Solutions - A National Credit Union Foundation Program

Yesterday I had the pleasure of talking to a representative from the FDIC who sought our advice on how financial instutions can provide access to affordable transaction products. I was able to give her a host of credit union examples as well as share our product toolkits with her. In talking with her I found that FDIC has just completed a “National Survey of Unbanked and Underbanked Households”... (continue reading)

In my work I get to see the very best of what credit unions do to serve their members…and sometimes I find something extraordinary to learn about and to share to our REAL Solutions readers. One such place is Harbor One Credit Union’s Multi-Cultural Banking Center.

I, along with our field coaches and league liaisons, had the opportunity to visit the center and to see first hand credit union philosophy – I mean business philosophy working. This sustainable banking operation builds solid partnerships to bring the best of financial and social services to unbanked working immigrants.

At the same time the financial services are affordable but are sustainable building reserves for other members. For this reason, I asked Field Coach Mark Meyers to delve into what it takes to build this operation so that other credit unions can determine if they too can offer immigrants sterling service….

Jim Blake President/CEO was clear this was a business decision for them – a good one as the credit union has seen double digit growth in both membership and assets in recent months. This is a must-read.

Click here to download the HarborOne Business Strategy Highlight.

For the final vote in this contest, we had:

5 videos from
5 credit unions from
4 leagues that received
2,190 votes
and when the poll cut off at 11:59pm on Friday night, you had chosen…

Because of a very interesting end result (good interesting!) we’re pushing back the announcement of the video contest winner by one day. We apologize very much for all of you waiting, but we can’t wait to tell the story.

Stay tuned for tomorrow!

This article is the sixth installment in a monthly series of interviews designed to provide REAL Solutions® League Liaisons and other league staff up-to-date strategies used by their peers to grow their REAL Solutions® efforts. This interview describes the efforts of the Credit Union League of Connecticut (CULCT)and the Connecticut Credit Union Solutions Foundation to develop and implement a Financial Reality Fair experience for high school students. Please learn more from this interview with Barbara Bass, CULCT’s Vice President—Education and Human Resource Development.