If you’ve tuned in to campus news any time over the past 10 years, you’ve probably heard of the General Student Services Fund, our student government’s poorly structured funding opportunity for student organizations. Every year, some service organizations are awarded upwards of $100,000 apiece, while others central to our community are left high and dry – leaving us to both foot the bill and suffer as a result.
I’ve come to believe that complete, public transparency as to how this fund operates will be necessary to countervail the bureaucratic inertia which has hindered past attempts at reform. Today, I want to share my knowledge of this process in the hope that, by realizing the absurd details of what’s occurring, you become as upset as I am that this is allowed to continue.
Next week, a new Associated Students of Madison constitution will come to a campus vote, and with it a rare opportunity to empower our student leaders with the tools they need to make what’s written here obsolete. I implore you to vote yes and, in so doing, bring some sanity to the way our dollars get handed out.
Matthew Manes
How to Gain GSSF Eligibility in 10 Easy Steps
So you’ve decided you want $100,000 for your student organization to provide a service to the campus? Excellent! Just follow these steps and you’ll be on your way to funding.
Pick a service you want to provide the student body
It doesn’t really matter what this service is because the people evaluating it will be bound by something called “viewpoint neutrality,” which means they cannot take your viewpoint into consideration. Or, put another way, it doesn’t matter how silly, stupid or out there your service is, because they’ll be judging you based on 16 yes or no criteria. If you meet the criteria, which is what this 10 step guideline is all about, then they are legally bound to fund your activities!
How, you might ask? It’s simple.
2. Design your organization to satisfy the GSSF
In order to qualify for GSSF funds, your group must be centered around providing to campus what’s defined as a “direct service.” The idea is that you’d be receiving funding, not for your own benefit, but for the benefit of the student body. The reality is a huge disconnect exists here – you, the applicant, not ASM, determine what you want to provide. I would still hope you, dear reader, use the information contained here with prudence because ultimately your peers will be forced to pay for it.
Anyway, a “direct service” is a program with the following characteristics:
The program can be available upon request by recipients
You need to be able to provide your service following a request by a student. You’re allowed to set specific dates and times for when you would put on your service, but you need to be prepared to provide your service outside of that as well.
The program can be tailored subject to the needs of the recipients within the mission of the group
This one can be tricky, but what it boils down to is you can’t have a one size fits all approach. Whether it’s providing subject matter in response to a student’s request or providing instruction that’s skill level and ability appropriate, you need some degree of recipient-specific customizability.
The program must be accessible to the recipients regardless of recipient’s participation and/or membership in the group
You can’t require recipients to participate as agents on behalf of your organization as part of your service. Make sure to avoid incorporating mission-furthering activities because while members actively further the goals of your organization, recipients do not.
The program must be available to recipients continually throughout the course of the fiscal year
This means when everyone else goes home for summer and winter breaks, you still need to be able to provide the service. You may have lower volume and shorter hours, but service still needs to be available.
The program is not an individual event, series of events, publication or a leadership development opportunity for group members.
The word “event” means a program occurring exclusively on a specific date set by your organization. An exemption exists such that if the program is also requestable, tailorable and educational, it can still qualify. However, publications and group development for your members still don’t.
The direct service must be educational but cannot be credit producing
This should be self-explanatory.
So, what kind of archetypal, plug-and-play program can you offer that has these characteristics? Why, workshops of course! Pick your activity, build a workshop to teach others how to do your activity, then make it requestable, tailorable, available year-round and boom! You have a direct service and have satisfied the first requirement for funding.
It isn’t enough though that you provide a direct service to warrant your $100,000 request, you need to satisfy several other requirements as well. They’re broken down as follows:
University student requirements
Four requirements deal with the issue of university students versus non-students. More than 75 percent of the time your organization spends planning, coordinating and implementing your direct service has to be spent on university students. The same goes for your programming in general.
Additionally, greater than 75 percent of the people who receive your programming, be it direct services or other, must be university students. The easiest way to make sure you satisfy these requirements is to require a student ID to do anything with your organization, thus sidestepping the issue entirely.
Your direct service must also be aimed at reaching all university students – essentially, to make an effort to reach out to the entire campus and aim to make it as universally accessible as possible. You don’t need to actually serve all students, nor do you need to have something with broad appeal, but you must aim at reaching everyone.
Direct service requirements
Because student organizations often do other activities in addition to direct services, there are requirements about how much direct service you do to qualify for funding.
First, you must provide a written mission statement for your direct service. Next, of all the time your organization spends planning, coordinating and implementing everything, more than 50 percent of that must be spent on your direct service.
Finally, you must demonstrate the university does not provide a substantially equivalent direct service. Other student organizations don’t count, and neither do university services that aren’t direct services.
Other Requirements
If you have not received GSSF funding before, you’ll need to submit a written plan on how you will administer your budget, a paragraph or two. Your group cannot have violated any laws or ASM/University policies in the past 2 years, and you must complete the application and show up to your hearing (duh).
Finally, your group must also be a Registered Student Organization and have written governing documents.
3. Write governing documents