Racine Dominicans

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Sister Grace Sbrissa is the Director of Finance for the Racine Dominicans, a religious community of women with 250 members all over the United States. "We do church work in justice issues, housing for women and all kinds of poverty situations," Sbrissa said. "It is a vibrant group that works on all kinds of issues, locally and worldwide. We take on many issues of injustice from those of the local city streets to those in Iraq. We are advocates providing the help needed for necessary changes."

Sbrissa herself has been through some changes. She worked for six years as a software and financial consultant to treasurers of religious institutes nationwide and in Europe before taking on the Director of Finance role. She became Director of Finance for the Racine Dominicans in Racine, Wisconsin, a year and a half ago.

Once she began working for Racine Dominicans, Sbrissa chose to use Sage MIP Fund Accounting. "We have been using it for about a year now. I would recommend it to others, in fact, I already have," Sbrissa said.

"When I arrived (at Racine Dominicans) what they had was obsolete and kept crashing. The first thing I did was to redo the whole network and software. What they had was a DOS-based system and it hadn't been updated in a long time. They needed a new chart of accounts and new reports," Sbrissa said.

Sbrissa was very familiar with financial software, but she found the software programs she had in mind would no longer work for her. "I was very familiar with another software package in its DOS version. When the software program changed to Windows, I didn't like the software for Windows at all. I was not getting the reports I needed. They made it a whole different program and it didn't have the flexibility I needed," Sbrissa said.

Drawing on all of her experience as a consultant and her knowledge of accounting software, Sbrissa selected Sage MIP Fund Accounting in March of 1999. She input monthly totals for the prior fiscal year and then began using Sage MIP Fund Accounting for the new fiscal year in September. Sbrissa found what she needed in Sage MIP Fund Accounting.

"I researched various packages to see how I could get what I needed. I liked the flexibility of Sage MIP Fund Accounting. There are so many options available-to fit almost any organization. I had to narrow it down to which features applied to us," Sbrissa said.

"One thing I love is the support system," Sbrissa said. She said this was not true with the other software packages she had used in the past. "I call support quite often. I always get the support I need. Most of the people in support have been so helpful. They stay with me on the phone; they answer my questions," she said.

Sbrissa said she took advantage of Teletraining to learn the basics of report formatting with the Sage MIP Fund Accounting system.

"Similar organizations will be happy with it," Sbrissa said. "(Sage MIP Fund Accounting) gives us timely reports that are organized and Windows compatible. This is what is most important for me."

RACINE DOMINICANS
Benedicta Bauer, who came to the United States from Germany, founded the Racine Dominicans in 1862. Today the religious community of women numbers 250 members who serve in the U.S., primarily in Wisconsin, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico and Texas.

Siena Center, located on the shore of Lake Michigan, is the home and central office of the Racine Dominicans.

In addition to supporting their members in their ministries, the Sisters support a number of institutions and programs which reflect the mission of the Racine Dominicans, including: St. Catherine's High School, the Senior Companion Program, Catherine Marian Housing for victims of domestic violence, the Adult Learning Program (teaching English to non-English speaking adults) and Villa St. Anna which provides housing and services to older adults.

In 1989 the Racine Dominicans established a Justice and Rights Commission to abolish racism, sexism and ageism; advocate for human rights; protect the environment and support housing efforts and education for the poor.

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