Societies Fund Guidance Notes 15/16
Societies Fund – grants to cover their essential running costs, activities and equipment
Activities Loans – loans to pay for things, e.g. events - that will be repaid with profits from that
activity (similar to a bank overdraft)
Eligibility:
If you are applying for money you must meet the following criteria;
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Be an active society i.e. hold regular events/meetings/training, regularly communicate with
the Students’ Union, regularly fundraise and/or take part in community events, demonstrate
a willingness to continue developing the society
Have at least 10 members signed up online
Be applying for something specific and have researched specific costs and obtained quotes
where relevant
Not be in debt with the Students’ Union
The application process:
Funding decisions are made by the Societies’ Committee which consists of full-time elected
officers and representatives from our range of clubs and societies. The committee meets weekly
during the Autumn and Spring term.
Applications should be submitted via email to charlie.t@sussexstudent.com and will be considered
at the next Societies Committee meeting. Please make sure your application is submitted at least
two weeks before you need the money as sometimes the Committee is unable to meet or
postpones funding decisions to find out more information.
Applications must be made by your Financial Reps.
If you are submitting a funding application for an event you must complete and return an Event
Information Pack with your application. These are available at www.sussexstudent.com/resources
Sometimes applications are partially granted, e.g. if the committee chooses to grant a reduced
amount or for only some of the items requested, and/or sometimes the committee grants funding
with additional conditions, e.g. that the society submit a report after the event or find a cheaper
quote.
The applicant will be notified by email of their application’s outcome, usually within 48 hours of the
meeting. If you were granted less money than you applied for or think the decision was unfair then
you are welcome to resubmit your application.
Spending your funding:
If your application is successful you will be given more information about how to spend the money
but please note that all payments over £30 will be made by cheque or bank transfer. Our cheques
are generally produced weekly so bear this in mind when planning your application and make sure
it is submitted well in advance.
You must spend the funding on the items specified in your application, if you wish to spend it on
other items you must reapply. Unless you request otherwise, you will have 3 months from being
notified of the funding decision to spend the money you are granted.
All or any publicity, promotional material, including the final product if appropriate must
acknowledge the support of the Students’ Union, e.g. ‘Funded by the Students’ Union included on
poster and in event programme.
What you can and can’t apply for:
Generally you can apply for anything your society needs to run effectively which could include
equipment, publicity materials, speaker expenses, affiliation fees… There is no limit (other than the
amount of money available) to how much funding you can apply for.
There are some restrictions on what the Students' Union, and therefore clubs and societies, can’t
spend money on. The money must be spent on things that relate to the aims and objectives
specified in your constitution. Everything that your club or society does should be “for students, as
students” but generally if you can argue an educational purpose for what you are doing, it is ok for
that activity to be funded by the Students’ Union.
Here are a few other key areas we can’t fund  Subsidising charity fundraising (you can still fundraise, but you need to cover the costs from
money raised or from society money that is not from the Students’ Union)
 Donating Students’ Union money to other charities
 Using Students’ Union money to pay for food and drink where it is not a core part of the
event, e.g. providing free food and drink at an Education Not For Sale rally. You are
allowed to use Union money to pay for food and drink where it is a core part of the event,
e.g. Wine Society organise a wine tasting and ask for funding to subsidise the cost of the
wines.
 Money granted by Societies Committee can only be used to affiliate to a national body
where the return service is good value, proportional to the fee paid, and in line with the
society’s aims e.g. Amnesty International society may affiliate to Amnesty International
provided that the fee is good value for what the society gets from it.
 Campaigns not directly related to our members as students. It is valid to use Students’
Union money to run a campaign on non-student issues provided it is educational and run
for/promoted only to students e.g. an on-campus event raising awareness about climate
change in the student body. It would not be permissible to use Students’ Union funds to
promote this campaign to non-students or to campaign outside the campus community e.g.
funding a coach to a national demo in London against climate change
 If a campaign did not fall into the permissible categories, you can fundraise and use the
club/society’s own money to fund the campaign as you wish
 Subsiding places on demos which don’t directly relate to student issues, e.g. climate
change.
 Funding flights within Europe as it goes against the Students’ Union Environmental Policy
You cannot apply for funding for things you have already paid for, all applications must be made in
advance of any spending.
How to help your application:
To give your application the best chance of being approved, follow our top tips:
Make sure the application form is filled in correctly and completely. If it looks like you can’t be
bothered to answer fully the committee might think you won’t bother to organise your activity
properly. You are welcome to attend the meeting to provide more information and/or you can
speak to your representative on the committee so they can help explain why your application is
worthy of funding.
Be realistic, it’s very unlikely that your application for £2000 worth of balloons for a single event will
be approved
Generally, the committee like to see as many people as possible benefiting from their funding as
possible so make sure you specify how many people will be involved/attend your event/use the
equipment
Show value for money, can you buy in bulk? Can you share equipment with other societies? Have
you asked different suppliers for quotes?
The committee is generally reluctant to repeatedly fund the same societies and/or activities so
consider how you can make your society and its activities more sustainable, consider organising
additional fundraising, sourcing external sponsorship or scaling down your plans to make them
more manageable
Has your society thought about if and how it will contribute to the costs involved? If you are asking
for a lot of money you should demonstrate that you are not just relying on Students’ Union funding.
Societies Fund Application Form
About your application
Date of application:
Society name:
Title of project/event:
Event date (if applicable):
Event information pack submitted
(compulsory for applications for events funding)
Date a decision is required by:
If granted the funding, you will have 3 months to spend the money.
How much money does your society currently have (you can ask in the Activities Centre for
details)?
If you have money in your account, please tell us why this money cannot be used for whatever
you’re applying for:
Applicant’s details (Must be a Finance Rep)
Name:
Committee position:
Phone number:
Email address:
Funding requested
Please include a detailed breakdown of all costs, e.g. equipment, publicity, travel, photocopying.
The fund cannot grant applications for payments already made
Items
e.g. 20 A3 posters
Cost
£50
Total funding requested
If you need more space, or your application is complex, please summarise your request above and
add more detail in the ‘additional information’ section at the end of this form.
Please tell us how many members you have signed up on www.sussexstudent.com:
In order to assess how much of the Societies Fund you will be allocated please answer the
following questions:
How many people will benefit directly from this funding, e.g. 15 people going to conference
How many people will benefit indirectly from this funding, e.g. 300 people at club night
How will the funding benefit your society members and Sussex students in general in the short,
medium and long term e.g. educationally, skills acquired etc.
If there are additional costs involved in your activity, e.g. transport to a competition, how will you
pay for this? How much will participants need to pay towards the activity?
If your society is organising or has already carried out any fundraising/sponsorship in addition to
this funding request please tell us here, the Committee are more likely to award funding to
societies who have made an effort to help themselves
Additional information
(If necessary please give additional information about your application below)
Once complete, submit your application via email to charlie.t@sussexstudent.com