Student Services Finance Committee discussed and approved Sex Out Loud’s eligibility, listened to an eligibility hearing for Badger SPILL and debated the purpose and use of the auxiliary fund at their Thursday, Sept. 17, meeting.

Sex Out Loud

Sex Out Loud was approved for eligibility after a brief clarification by one of their facilitators and a discussion that followed among SSFC representatives.

Sex Out Loud Facilitator Rachel McDonald clarified a scheduling point that caused some confusion during their first eligibility hearing.

Sex Out Loud makes their case at SSFC meeting

Representatives were unsure of what would happen if too few people showed up to Sex Out Loud programs, and there was confusion as to if the programs were then canceled or not.

McDonald explained when there are too few people who show up for their programs, they do not cancel their programs. Rather, they are rescheduled and the people who had shown up previously are considered a priority.

Representative Colin Barushok said Sex Out Loud demonstrated they have the ability to provide programs for students.

After several more minutes of discussion, SSFC members approved of Sex Out Loud’s eligibility with a vote of 9-0. Two members abstained.

Badger SPILL

SSFC also heard Badger Supporting peers in laid-back listening’s presentation for eligibility.

Established in 2009, Badger SPILL is a program for students to anonymously submit a “spill,” or problem they need help with, to the Badger SPILL website. The student will then receive a response within 24 hours providing empathy, advice and encouragement, Badger SPILL President Adela Tomsegova said.

The messages students share to Badger SPILL are completely confidential. The spills that students send are sent to trained SPILL supporters who are qualified to provide help or encouragement in certain areas students may need help in, Tomsegova said.

Tomsegova said Badger SPILL also works closely with University Health Services to keep up with new policies on how to best serve students.

Badger SPILL plans to expand their advertising by placing advertisements on buses. Much of what SPILL does is advertise to students by using stress balls, water bottles and newspaper ads to let students know they are available for them, Tomsegova said.

SSFC Vice Chair Brett DuCharme asked about Badger SPILL’s analysis of advertising and the effectiveness of the cost.

Tomsegova said Badger SPILL analyzed information to find the best way to spread the word about Badger SPILL. They decided bus advertisements would be most effective.

Representative Kyle Watter also asked about the number of supporters currently reading spills.

Currently, Tomsegova said, Badger SPILL has about 200 supporters. But that number varies as they are currently training new members.

Badger SPILL’s eligibility will be determined at next week’s meeting Monday, Sept. 21.

Auxiliary fund

SSFC also had a lengthy, but heated debate about the auxiliary fund. The auxiliary fund is used to fund expanding student organizations that are expanding at a rate at which they need additional funding.

Some of the organizations that receive funding from the auxiliary fund are close to the budget cap. In fact, there was much debate about the student organization Greater University Tutoring Service, whose constant expansion and growth needs additional funding.

SSFC kicks off first meeting of the semester, reviews eligibility, summer recap

There was discussion about raising the caps and rewriting the language of the auxiliary fund, but SSFC soon became divided about the issue.

There was a disagreement between representatives, as some wished to continue to talk about the auxiliary fund at the SSFC meeting, while others wished to create a task force to deal with the funds purpose. 

After a continual debate about whether to continue the discussion about the auxiliary fund or create a separate task force to talk about the fund, SSFC Chair Thuy Pham addressed SSFC representatives.

SSFC needs to have a timeline and a goal, meaning that SSFC needs to see where this is going and how this issue is going to be resolved in order to move on, Pham said.

Eventually, SSFC motioned to have the chair come up with a specific issue concerning the auxiliary fund.

SSFC will discuss the auxiliary fund next week Monday, Sept. 21.