The Student Services Finances Committee met Thursday to continue discussion of the General Student Services Fund and to amend the bylaws.
ASM Funding Advisor Abbie Wagaman led the discussion, starting with a follow-up about the Eligibility Criteria Review Committee discussed at last week’s meeting.
The committee also evaluated the application process. At a previous meeting, the SSFC talked about replacing Qualtrics for the application, and GSSF organizations agreed that Qualtrics was a barrier to them.
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Completing these changes presents multiple options, Wagaman said. The options are creating an ad-hoc GSSF committee, continuing regular meetings for the SSFC or waiting until next year.
The ad-hoc committee will create a smaller committee to discuss these changes and continue the discussion into next year. The regular meeting will mean that the SSFC will meet about these changes for the remainder of the year. There are three meetings remaining this term.
Representatives Nat Suri and Kevin Jacobson agreed to finish these discussions during regular meetings. The committee discussed options for submission, settling on using a Word document for the application. The process would be similar to a Canvas submission, where the questions are on one document, and the answers are written on a different document. Jacobson said this will help collaboration within the organizations, instead of one person doing the Qualtrics form.
Due to elections being underway, talks of transitioning knowledge is a concern for the committee. SSFC Chair Lennox Owino said future committee members can talk to him at any time for help with transition. There is also a transition document for people coming into the SSFC.
The second new business item was Section 2 bylaw amendments, with the discussion led by Jacobson. Bylaw amendments included changing the internal budget proposal due date to Nov. 15, before the committee’s meeting with the chancellor. If the committee could not finalize the internal budget by this date, they would enter a dead-lock. They also removed contracts for GSSF groups. Another change is that any budgets over $500,000 need to be approved by student referendum.
The next SSFC meeting will be April 4.
