Before joining ECS in 1975, he served as a congressional staff member and was executive assistant to the Chancellor of the University of Maine System.
Aims specializes in education policy and governance.
He initiated the ECS State Postsecondary Education Structures Sourcebook , and is a principal contributor to the December 1997 edition. Over the past fifteen years, Aims has advised many of the states that have undergone major restructuring of their higher education systems. He advised New Jersey leaders on development and implementation of the 1994 Higher Education Restructuring Act. He advised Kentucky Governor Paul Patton throughout the process leading to the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997. He was an advisor to a Governor's Task Force in Louisiana on community and technical college governance that led to a new system in that state in 1998.