Officer Reports for May 2nd 2014
GSA Treasurers Report – Jessica Aubin
-
-
We continue to appreciate the patience that you and your RGSO’s have had throughout
the transition.
It is important moving forward with the new system next year, that RGSO reps that come
to the trainings and assembly meetings are relaying information that they receive to the
rest of their RGSO’s, especially if other members are the ones that are submitting
financial requests. There have been many errors in submissions, much of which is due to
what seems to be a lack of good communication within RGSO groups.
Are there ways that we could help the RGSO’s next year to make sure that you only have
to submit a request once?
We have a meeting set up for the week of 5/5 with UAS to discuss at length some of the
concerns we have with their practices, lack of good communication, and poor
representation and attentiveness to our needs as a student group. If you have any concerns
that you would like us to bring to the meeting please email me directly at
gsatreas@albany.edu .
Below is the budget as of 5/1/14:
GSA Budget as of
5/1/14
July 1, 2013- June 30,
2014
Revenue
Projected
Revenue:
$194,788
UAS Cash:
$30,000
Contingency
Budget:
$22,500
Total:
Actual
Revenue:
Actual
Budget:
Total
Allocated:
Total Paid
as of
5/1/14:
$180,603
$188,103
$154,589
$110,452
$202,288
Expenses
Budget
Services
GSA Direct
Sponsor
Events:
RGSO:
MCAA:
Programming:
Allocated Paid
$6,000
$3,664
$3,664
$35,000
$6,000
$6,000
$35,000
$2,821
$3,255
$13,145
$2,670
$917
Notes
Grants:
GSA
Orientation
Picnic:
GSA End of
Year Event:
GSA
Assembly
Meetings:
Total:
Stipends
Salaries
$34,665
$19,555
$2,000
$2,000
$2,000
$2,000
$2,000
$1,000
$219
$101,000
Budget
Operations
Office
$43,000
New
Computers
Copier and
Printers
Telephone
and Fax
Organization
Liability
Insurance
Office
Supplies
Total:
Grants Chair
MCAA Chair
Programming
Chair
Treasurer
VicePresident
President
Lead Senator
and Senators
Total:
Office
Managers (5)
Web Master
Total
$219
$83,624
$42,170
Allocated Paid
Notes
$6,000
$4,330
$4,330
$35,000
$22,635
$22,635
$1,000
$822
$702
$1,000
$886
$886
$15,000
$4,751
$4,751
$58,000
$3,000
$3,000
$33,424
$3,000
$2,625
$33,304
$2,625
$2,250
$3,000
$3,000
$2,625
$3,500
$3,500
$3,062
$3,500
$3,500
$3,062
$4,500
$4,500
$3,938
$1,000
$0
$21,500
$20,125
$17,562
$20,000
$17,416
$17,416
$17,416
$0
$17,416
$0
$20,000
*Includes
summer
(8,000 for
Sum 13,
$35,000for Fall,
Spring,
Sum 1314
Proposed Budget for July 1, 2014- June 30, 2015
GSA Proposed Annual
Budget
July 1, 2014- June 30, 2015
Statement of Estimated Revenue
and Expenses
Revenue
Projected Revenue:
UAS Cash:
Contingency Budget:
$190,000.00
Total:
$175,000.00
$15,000.00
Expense
s
Services
GSA Direct Sponsor
Events:
RGSO:
MCAA:
Programming:
Grants:
GSA Orientation
Picnic:
GSA End of Year
Event:
GSA Assembly
Meetings:
Total:
$6,000.00
$35,000.00
$6,000.00
$6,000.00
$35,000.00
$2,000.00
$2,000.00
$1,000.00
$93,000.00
Operation
s
Office
Copier and Printers
Telephone and Fax
Organization Liability
Insurance
(1 lease, 3 service
$22,500.00 contracts)
$1,000.00
$1,000.00
Office Supplies
Total:
Stipends
Grants Chair
MCAA Chair
Programming Chair
Treasurer
Vice- President
President
Lead Senator and
Senators
Total:
Salaries
Office Managers (5)
Web Master
Total
(Includes paper for
all three campuses,
water, other general
supplies for all three
$15,000.00 campus offices)
$40,000.00
$3,000.00
$3,000.00
$3,000.00
$3,500.00
$3,500.00
$4,500.00
$1,000.00
$21,500.00
$20,000.00
$1,000.00
$21,000.00
MCAA Chair Report - Nantasha Williams
-
Updated MCAA Form (will try to post online and bring copies of this to the meeting)
Established protocols to receiving funds (discuss these at the GA meeting)
Hosted another film screening with EGSO (The University of Sing Sing)
Canceled Diversity Potluck Mixer because no one responded to the initial outreach email
Grants Chair Report – Kim Berg
The difficulties with Purchase Requests in order to process grant reimbursements, in the
MyInvolvement system, have been resolved. The reimbursement process has resumed and over
one-third of awardees have submitted reimbursement paperwork and have either received their
refunds or are in the process of receiving. The new document upload process seems successful
and has enabled us to streamline how reimbursements are forwarded.
The Summer grants program has already received applications. That application period will
close on June 1 and will cover summer research/professional development costs, as well as
unforeseen expenses for students who undertook research/professional development during the
Spring 2014 semester. Only students who did not receive a grant in the Spring can apply for
funding during the Summer 2014 period.
Vice President Report – Kat Slye
Additional & Summer Funding Requests: The RGSO Committee reviewed the requests for
additional Spring and Summer funding and the RGSOs have been e-mailed their new award
letters. All requests were granted the additional or summer funding.
Voucher Reminders:
1. Remember to double check that you have uploaded all required paperwork when you
submit a voucher. The ones people are usually forgetting are the RGSO Calendar or the
payee certification. We don’t want to have to cancel a request for lack of documentation.
2. If you have one person who made multiple purchases from multiple places, you can
submit all of those purchases on one voucher. Thus, you only have to submit one voucher
per person you need to reimburse for funds spent.
3. Over the summer, the E-board will be working with UAS to try to simplify the voucher
process. We will try to combine forms and possibly eliminate things we don’t really need
from you. We will also be working on simplifying the requirements overall and making
changes to the RGSO Handbook. If you have any feedback or ideas of how we might do
this, please feel free to e-mail me at gsavp@albany.edu.
Programming Chair – Hanna Pageau
-We are waiting on reports from finances about the results of the Campus Clean-up.
- The End of the Year event will be held in Dutch Quad, however, as a backup we will serve
food in the Uptown GSA Office in the event of poor weather.
President’s Report – Caitlin Janiszewski
President’s Forum – We had a successful President’s Forum which went was programmatically
perfect. Hanna did a wonderful job with coordinating everything. We will continue to improve
upon the President’s Forum each semester as we continue and open dialogue with the President.
UAS – UAS has agreed to a meeting in which we will confront them some important issues. As
some of you know it has become apparent that the financial process dictated to us by UAS is out
of compliance with NYS tax law. This, plus the payee cert surprise, plus our many past issues
with UAS makes this meeting long overdue.
New officers – I’m very excited to welcome our new officers. Justin Chase has been elected to
be our new treasurer, Brittany Glen will be our new MCAA chair, Ryan Gregoire will be our
new Lead Senator, Kat Slye will continue as our Vice President, and I’m very happy to be
serving as your President for another year.
Move upstairs – We are hammering out details with campus management about moving to the
third floor for the foreseeable future as the campus center expansion project is completed. It
looks like we will need substantial work done on the rooms we will be moving into in order to
have the electricity to support our computers and printers so we will likely not be open this
summer.
Senate – By the time I give this report I will have an update for you on the fate of the
CAFFECoR amendment to the University Senate and should be able to report who the new vice
chair is.
Appointments – Having only a few weeks between the election and the final assembly meeting I
am not able to say who I plan on appointing for programming chair, grants chair, and Senators in
this report. I will hopefully be making all my decisions by Tuesday or Wednesday.
East campus apology – I want to apologize to the East Campus students for all of their technical
difficulties this semester.
Communications – Our communications director continues to work on an end of the year
newsletter, an organizational map, network map, and orientation videos that we can utilize for
recruitment and retention in the future.
RGSO guidelines – As some of you know, when I was elected last year I committed to reforming
our grants program. RGSO guidelines are next. I know that the guidelines are cumbersome, the
penalties can be steep for minor infractions, they are not paperless even though we have moved
online, and they are subject to change each semester leading to inconsistencies. New members of
the E-Board have already been working on ideas on how to simplify the RGSO guidelines, make
them fairer, and finally we intend to make them only changeable with an assembly vote. Moving
the system online secured our accounting processes, now we need to make this process simpler
for everyone. I thank you for your patience this year.
Finally, I just want to acknowledge some people for their work this year. First, I want to thank all
those who have served on the executive board, especially those who came on mid-year and
jumped into some very difficult situations. I want to thank our Senators, council reps, and our
UAS board rep Genevieve Kane. I want to thank everyone who worked in the office this year.
The office is a very difficult place to work at times so I appreciate the patience they have shown.
I want to thank the bylaws committee for their commitment, especially Gary Roth for his
passionate participation, and Melissa Murata-Gomez for her selfless efforts. Whatever conflict
we may have over the content of the bylaws, their committee’s service is exemplary.
There a few faculty and staff which have shown indispensible support this year – Miriam
Trementozzi of Community Engagement who always showed incredible patience, Mary Ellen
Mallia and Mary Alexis Leciewski from the sustainability office who always restored my faith
when I felt hopeless, Joette Stefl-Mabry, Cynthia Fox, and Helene Scheck who provided
incredible guidance throughout this year, Beth Conrad somehow always met me with a smile no
matter how much I pestered her, and Bret Benjamin in particular has truly made exceptional
sacrifices to support us this year.
A very special thanks to the Wages and Benefits Committee for establishing a foundation for us
to advocate for graduate student well being. Thanks to Jackie Hayes who dedicated her time to
chair the W&B and did an amazing job.
There are two members of the Executive Board who I need to give special thanks, and they are
the only members who have stuck with me this entire year. Kim Berg our grants chair scores a
perfect ten on the officer scoring sheet. Very rarely have I ever had to request more paperwork
on a grant voucher or purchase request. She came on board in the summer last year, and ran the
grants program without a guarantee that her appointment would be approved in the fall. We
partnered to re-write and significantly improve the grants guidelines after which she took the
initiative to further improve and simplify the process by moving it online and adjusting the
process for the online system. She continues seek out best practices to improve our professional
development goals. When I her for her interview last summer I barely knew her, and now she is
one of my best friends.
Jessica Aubin has done more this year to support me and my vision for the GSA than anyone on
the face of the earth. As our treasurer, she has gone far above and beyond to work towards
making us a strong entity which can defend and support the graduate student body. She is tough
as nails and a pain in the butt. But every time she gave me a hard time, it made me a better
officer and a better leader. I cannot express how indebted I am to Jessica for everything she has
done this year. She has walked me through panic attacks, supported me when I was shaking with
fear under pressure, and endured long exhausting days to help this organization take itself to a
whole new level. She has fought like a warrior to gain the GSA the respect of our University
community. Don’t let her “I don’t care” face fool you, she cares more than anyone.
Finally, I need to thank someone who isn’t here anymore – Amber Wilmot. Last summer when I
started as your President, she was our lead office manager, one of many who were trying to help
us stand on our own feet. But more than that, Amber inspired me to pursue a great vision for the
GSA. There was a moment in which I had a realization about what this job was, who we could
be, and what it would take. I was frozen with hesitation wondering if it was worth it, thinking
about the risks that could emerge, and especially wondering if the direction I was taking us was
the right one. I presented my dilemma and she destroyed all my hesitation saying “it’s about time
we make some noise”. None of our progress this year would have been possible without Amber
Wilmot.
P.S. thanks to our awesome assembly for always showing up <3 see you in the fall 