Chair Matt Manes introduces SSFC

Members of Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan’s nerves were put to rest Thursday night when members of the student government unanimously voted to accept part of the organization’s funding application past its deadline.

In their application, which was submitted in August, MEChA forgot to attach a portion explaining all the organization’s finances from last year.

With such an integral part of the application missing, MEChA could have been denied funding.

However, Student Services Finance Committee members agreed the mix-up was partly their own fault, since they sent out an e-mail notifying the organization their application had been received, when it in fact was missing information.

“Both parties recognized there was human error on their behalf,” said Ismael Cuevas, MEChA’s publicity coordinator.

In the second round of this year’s eligibility hearings, MEChA, an organization whose goal is to create a diverse campus community by educating students about Chicano and Mexican culture, explained the direct services their CulturArte program provides students.

Cuevas said CulturArte is an educational program that was started in 2008 to empower students and enhance their art skills through programs and workshops tailored to individual and student organization’s needs.

Last year approximately 600 students took advantage of CulturArte’s workshops, which focused on a variety of topics including Mexican muralism and graffiti, Cuevas said.

The Working Class Student Union also appeared before SSFC at Thursday night’s meeting.

WCSU, whose mission is to support and advocate for working class and first-generation students while educating the entire UW campus about class diversity, received $57,639 in funding for the 2010-2011 academic year.

SSFC members voiced their concerns, questioning whether or not the organization is an asset to all students on campus or just to those who identify themselves as “working-class.”

According to Heidi Freymiller, WCSU president, the organization does target marginalized students with lower socioeconomic statuses; however they still have members, called allies, who do not identify themselves as “working class.”

“We think that every single student on this campus benefits from an organization that acknowledges socioeconomic differences among the campus population,” Freymiller said.

Student Leadership Program, who had their eligibility hearing Monday, was granted funding eligibility for the 2011-12 and 2012-13 academic years in a 7 to 1 vote.

Committee members debated whether the organization’s four paid coordinator positions devoted a sufficient amount of their time to the implementation of services that directly benefit UW students.

Representative Cale Plamann, who was the only no vote against granting the organization funding, felt SLP’s coordinators were spending a majority of their time on administrative work.

However, Representative Aliyya Terry said she felt large organizations, like SLP, who thrive off work done by volunteers, could not exist without coordinators’ overseeing the individual committees.

Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment was also granted eligibility in an 8-0 vote.

Committee members praised the presentation given by PAVE Chair Claire Peterson at Monday night’s eligibility hearing, agreeing well over a majority of the organization’s time is dedicated to providing direct services to UW students.