The University Student Senate (USS) updated its event guidelines this month after the administration enforced overall budget changes for the senate earlier this semester.

Leonardo Ruales, chair of the Finance Committee on the senate, spoke to the community at a public forum on October 9 about the recent budget changes and what it means for students looking to get event funding from the USS.

The New School Free Press reported that the USS can no longer have a Material Fund or Academic Fund as of the new 2024-2025 funding guidelines. The USS can no longer utilize the Material Fund to help students with personal projects, as the school will not allow them to finance individual students with senate funding due to IRS regulations. 

“The administration said, [USS is] not going to manage the funds anymore, but rather, [the administration is] going to be the ones that are going to be deciding where the funding is going to focus,” Ruales said. 

With the updated guidelines, the USS can now fund three types of student organizations or groups. They can provide event funding for Registered Student Organizations (RSOs), independent student groups, and independent student initiatives.

An independent student initiative is “a proposal geared toward programming, event planning, or creative projects directed by one or more students and open to the entire student body” according to the Fall 2024-2025 Funding Guidelines.

“These funds cannot benefit one singular experience or individual. Now, material from an academic fund was to generally help financially or materially, an individual or someone who was in need. But now, with the new funding policies, basically, it has to come to help and support the entire school community,” Ruales said. 

Student organizations, groups, or initiatives can make a budget request under one of four categories: Small Event Requests, Medium Event Requests, Large Event Requests, and Major University Initiative Events. 

Small events are capped at 100 people, medium events are capped at 250 people, and large events are for over 300 guests. Small events do not need a certificate of insurance, but medium and large events do. Event requests can receive a range from $2,000 to $7,500 in funding, depending on the event size.  

Small and medium requests typically need at least 21 days’ notice, but larger requests must submit a proposal eight weeks in advance. 

Major university initiative events are events where student organizations partner directly with TNS. They require at least four RSOs or independent organizations to sponsor them. These major university initiatives can reward student organizations up to $10,000. Proposals are required 12 weeks before the event. 

As for future action by the USS, Raules said he wants to push back against the funding halts and get more transparency from the university about budgeting decisions and restrictions; “We’re going to continue in the fight because we’ve been taking a lot of action when it comes to pressuring the university to make sure that everything is very transparent to students. And we want to make sure to have the ability to continue funding clubs on campus.”