SSC Meeting Minutes | September 9, 2011
Faculty/Staff Present: Brenda Coble Lindsey, Morgan Johnston, Tim Lindsey, Sarah Taylor Lovell, John
Prince
Students Present: Suhail, Katie, Jessica, Kevin, Amy, Marika, Ari
1. Setting up of future full committee meeting times – watch out for out-coming email for finalized
dates
2. Case by case discussion for future student RFP funding
a. Discussion of funding cap for half-semester: up to $5k, $15k?
b. Still capped at $3k per request
c. ACTION ITEM: Change language in RFP to reflect maximum funding as $5,000 and full
amount available is $12,500 (over full academic year = $50k)
3. Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs (Rene Romano) meeting update
a. Make all refundable fees (5 or 6 of them) non-refundable – main reason seems to be
ability to cut staff who primarily do staff refunds
b. We have 22% refund rate
c. We would get same amount as we get now (78%) – total fees would go from $69 to $62,
after this decrease, no refundable fees
d. Not clear how it would get put on student ballot: 1) as administrator (w/o student
signatures), or 2) get student signatures first
e. Changes to fees in the future? Ballot or SFAC (service fee advisory committee)
f. Opposition on campus mostly from within Senate: Might not be easy referendum to
pass
g. Interest on SSC funds? We currently get interest on $2, but not $14 – didn’t get an
answer from VCSA.
h. Thoughts:
i. Good idea to do – would help us, but might not be well-supported
ii. Would have trouble getting support for it
iii. Would have bad turnout for voting if during Fall
iv. No downside: if we lose, nothing changes; we don’t take flak
v. Risk of added awareness of potential to refund fees?
vi. This might be the only thing on the Fall ballot – selling point is your fees go
down
vii. Fees as a public good; everyone should be paying for
viii. When I was student, I collected refundable fees, I didn’t like other people
allocating the funds
ix. Economic times: tuition and fees are high. Wouldn’t hurt to have Romano owe
you a favor.
x. Refund process has become a lot easier recently
4. RFP
a. Changes: 1) letters of inquiry due around 10/24, 2) proposal due anytime w/in 6 weeks
of notification – keeps it open instead of limiting us, 3) hold 10% until final report,
contingent on “satisfactory” project, 4) if you run a deficit on the account, project
terminated  Modified in award letter, but will be changed to require signature for
terms and conditions
b. Is #3 possible? You’d end up running a deficit on an account – we don’t know the
details here
c. Will be able to monitor this closely once Union position start
d. How would you do this 10% thing – how would one submit a final report without 10% of
funding?
e. Alternative repercussions? College gets no more projects funded until offender fixes
account
f. We probably don’t want to do this 10% thing
g. Should include funding guidelines in RFP
h. What does it mean to terminate a project after the money’s already been spent?
i. Calls into question the idea that the Committee should lead the University – should
rather work with the university and make things more sustainability
5. Funding guidelines
a. Would like to put these on the RFP
b. How do we make them clearer?
c. ACTION ITEM for all SSC members: look through guidelines, brainstorm, send feedback
via email
d. “in the past, the funding we’ve given, they have met these sort of standards” – rather
than a guideline
e. Looking for something more explanatory – paragraph rather than bullets
i. What do we care about and why?
f. List of SSC objectives? No.
i. Would be good to agree to clear mission and vision as well
ii. There are objectives for Committee and for the RFP specifically
g. ACTION ITEMS: send us comments on what should be there/should not be
Possible guidelines:
Dealing with unreasonable budgets