UW-Milwaukee Student Association Approves Funding for Student Org Cameras, Trips

The UW-Milwaukee Student Association gave away more than $10,000 in grants to clubs that petitioned for grant money for everything from new equipment such as cameras and going on trips around Wisconsin and other states.

The $10,731 for these Nov. 7 grants comes from segregated fees students pay as a part of their tuition. Registered student organizations interested must attend the RSO grant training and sign up for a hearing date; however they can only request a total of four grants per semester.

Grant money can be requested for the following circumstances: Travel, operations and emergency once a semester, and up to four events per semester. Each type of grant is allotted a certain amount of money, for example the travel grant only funds a maximum of four students and covers $250 per ticket.

During this hearing, the most common grant requests were operation and travel.

After all the usual business had been taken care of, student representatives were called forward to present their grant requests to the committee. Sarah Dadrass is this year’s appropriation director. “SAC grants enable me to directly have an effect on helping out students,” she said.

Most groups elected one or two individuals to represent them. A total of six groups presented in front of the Student Association. Several of the organizations were associated with art and design, including Ceramics Club, Sculpture Club and AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Artists). The other three groups included Association of Graduate Students in Neuropsychology, the Jewish student group, Chabad, and Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM). Since the organizations interested sign up for a specific time slot not all the groups were present at the beginning of the meeting.

According to Dadrass, SAC helps students, “of any and all backgrounds to do what they are passionate about through the outlet of their organizations.”

During their individual hearings groups were subjected to various questions and reminders in relation to their requests. Sometimes SA members asked questions because they were genuinely curious, other times they challenged various aspects of the request, such was the case with Sculpture club.

Sculpture Club, a relatively new club here on campus, had requested an operations grant which caps at $3500. As part of the process Sculpture club provided members with a list of supplies the club intends to buy, included on this list was a projector and several cameras. Move up

Several questions arose during their hearing, pertaining to the supplies and storing issues.

Concerns over the necessity of a new projector came about since in past events Sculpture club had had access to one and utilized it.

Sculpture Club representative explained that current projector is an older model that is difficult to hide during events when the focus should be on the work, a newer projector and therefore smaller one wouldn’t detract from the art piece.

Another issue SA members had with objects on the supplies list included the cameras.

According to Dadrass problems with student organizations and cameras had occurred in the past mainly that cameras were either misplaced or were being used for personal use.

Sculpture Club assured SA that they were creating a system to keep track of the cameras and that all Sculpture Club supplies would be stored in a locked room in the Sculpture Lab.

After a few more questions and explanations SA approved Sculpture Club for their grant request total of nearly $2535.According to AIGA members, Angela Ryan and Emily Adkins, presenting in front of the board isn’t as scary as it may seem.

“It’s easier to have a conversation in person,” said Adkins. “Though there is a lack of understanding sometimes about technicalities.”

Most of the grant amounts requested were approved by the SA.

Ceramics Arts Student Association otherwise known as C.A.S.A. received approval for both their grants, a travel one and an operations one.

They are planning to travel to Portland, Oregon for an education seminar on ceramics on their travel grant. Four-hundred will go to registration, $944 will go to lodging and $1000 will go to flights. Their operations grant, a request for office supplies including bags and tissue papers for when they sell their work, received approval but capped at $125 per SAC regulations. In total they received $2469.

Association of Graduate Students in Neuropsychology also requested an operations grant to buy three new books for their library. Their representative received approval for the original amount of $388.66 requested.

SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management) requested an operations grant and a travel grant. Their operations grant came to a total of $421.03 after approval for supplies to help them organize their group. A travel grant for $241.73 was also approved so they could participate in the HR Games in Janesville, a competition for students in human resourcing.

Chabad was the only group to receive less than they asked for, for their event grant. The original amount accumulated to $4074.21, they received $3775.75 instead.

Part of the reason Chabad received less is because they planned to rent a car for a speaker coming for their event. SA can only approve a rental car for 48 hours, after that the organization must pay for it. At $40 per day, Chabad received $80 for car rental for a total of two days being covered out of the three.

After a brief pause, AIGA came forward to present their three grant requests, one for operations and two events.

For their operations grant they received $300 for supplies to use for marketing their weekly events. They received another $300 for an event, they are planning to host a speaker on the topic of lettering and typography. For their final grant they were approved for another $300 to host an end of the year event in the spring. In total AIGA received $900 worth of grant money.

When the last of the approvals had been granted and there were no more questions or concerns the meeting adjourned, two hours earlier than expected.

The final grant hearing for fall semester took place Monday Nov. 14 at 5 p.m.

Grant hearings will take place in spring for activities in fall 2017.