With Student Government elections right around the corner, many potential voters are thinking the same thing: Why should I care?
Since the activities and accomplishments of Student Government often go unnoticed, it is difficult for constituents to relate to, let alone actively support, their future representatives. Students tend to err on the side of indifference when it comes to their student body officers, a sentiment directly reflected by a voter turnout of approximately 18 percent in the 2015 election. However, there are approximately 222,938 compelling reasons to vote this year.
In 2015, $222,938 was allocated for use by student organizations. With more than 400 organizations on campus, there is about $560 available for each, were they all to claim their allotted funding.
Unfortunately, this has not been the case. In 2015, an astounding 27 percent went unused by student organizations. And all money designated for student organizations that is not spent goes back to the university at the end of the year, meaning it is no longer available for use by students.
As puzzling as this may seem, the underutilization of student funds can be easily attributed to the difficulty of applying for and obtaining money from the university. Largely the result of bureaucratic red tape, many organizations find the process of receiving funding to be unnecessarily difficult and time-consuming. Furthermore, USC requires organizations to submit a budget application at least five weeks prior to an event, a time frame that is incompatible with the needs of many clubs on campus.
While streamlining a bureaucracy is an inherently difficult task, this is one problem that can be easily resolved by the student electorate. Nick Santamaria, a second-year student at the USC Honors College studying political science, is running for student body treasurer with the intention of simplifying the notoriously frustrating process of student organization funding. As the current treasurer of USC’s Mock Trial team, Santamaria is well acquainted with the difficulties associated with getting money from the university.
“The process just doesn’t work for organizations. For an organization to be successful they have to be able to have access to funds, and that’s, I think, the biggest obstacle towards a lot of students being able to do a lot of great things here at USC,” Santamaria said.
Santamaria’s platform is based on simplicity, engagement and transparency, three things seriously lacking from the current organization funding system. In order for students to fund their organizations, they must go through the same process that departments and professors do to pay their bills, a time-consuming endeavor that has forced many clubs to simply stop trying.
“Organizations cannot operate in a system that takes seven weeks, three different forms, and a whole bunch of different signatures in order to get money. It’s just not feasible and it doesn’t work,” Santamaria said. “[Student organization funding] needs to be a process that is specifically tapered for the students, that way they’re able to access money in a way that makes sense for them, not in a way that is a business model,” he said.
If elected, Santamaria intends to distinguish between student funding and other university expenditures in order to make the system more user-friendly. The money designated for organizations comes directly from students’ tuition, and, as beneficiaries of this university, we are entitled to have access to this money in the simplest way possible — a belief that is central to Santamaria’s campaign.
Clubs and organizations are the heart and soul of this university, and students should be able to support their endeavors as promised by the school. As the elections approach, keep this in mind, and consider Nick Santamaria for student body treasurer.