For the upcoming 2023-24 school year, the Wheaton College Student Government Association (SGA) made a big change to how they fund clubs.
In previous years, SGA had clubs petition for funds. This included filling out a detailed budget proposal of events they have planned for the upcoming year, and how much money those events would cost. SGA would then look over the proposal and determine how much of that money to actually give the club. The entire process of filling out the proposal can be time consuming, so with the new system, SGA is hoping to bypass a lot of the petitioning by assigned clubs a base allocation.
The base allocation is an average of what a club has spent over the past five years. The idea is that by calculating this average, clubs will be able to host all their usual events without the extra work of detailing a budget. However, a massive pitfall with the system right now is that it includes years where clubs have operated under COVID-19.
The pandemic made it virtually impossible for clubs to host any events whatsoever, and as a result, spending was very low. Those years are included when finding the average of a club’s spending, and so the ‘past five years’ calculation is not entirely accurate, and is far lower than it should be for many clubs.
Madeleine Stevens, a junior involved with Sustainability Board, told me “SGA gave us $800 for next year – 800 isn’t even really enough to fully cover one event.” Other members of the board say SGA gave them around $4,000 for the 2022-23 school year. This sharp decrease limits their flexibility to host events in the upcoming year.
Clubs can reject their base allocation and petition for more money, similar to the previous system, where they are required to fill out a proposal that details purchases within the school year, and SGA decides funding from there.
While this can be time consuming, SGA members find it favorable to the old system. SGA member Olivia Deschenes says “the process of getting funding is frustrating and time consuming for club leaders, but this new process makes it slightly easier.” SGA are hopeful that as the base allocation system improves, less clubs will need to petition for additional funds.
A criticism that has been directed toward this new system is that by using averages, it prevents clubs from expanding either the number of events they host, or the scale.
Edyn Willey, the communication coordinator for the SGA finance committee, says that the new system still allows for expansion. “If they want to take the initiative to plan out other future events they can always add that to the budget.” she says. “We always encourage students to plan out future events that could be bigger and better.”
According to Willey, “what we’re really trying to do is cut back on excessive spending that some clubs are contributing to so that the club experience at Wheaton is more equal and equitable.”
I believe that while the first year of this new system is off to a rocky start, as the system continues to improve, and starts to not factor in pandemic years, it will be a lot more effective than the old system, and it will save club leaders a lot of time and energy on petitioning for funds from the student government.
Journalism 2.0 