David Lei | Democratizing SAC funding

One million, seven hundred eighty-two thousand, two hundred and twelve dollars. Drawn from the General Fee we pay with tuition, this is the funding Penn student government received for the current academic year. Most students are oblivious to the inner-workings of that six-tentacled creature, student government, though interest has been raised in the past few weeks. But this our money. And we should demand better accountability in how it is spent.

Much of the spending goes to fund Penn’s student groups. The Student Activities Council, one of the six branches of student government, is responsible for allocating more than $800,000 to over 140 student groups across campus that received funding this year. That makes it arguably the branch with the greatest daily impact on undergraduates. And I believe it is in serious need of reform.

SAC’s general body is composed of representatives chosen by each SAC-funded and -recognized group. It elects, from this membership, an executive committee to administer decision-making and issue recommendations to the general body. The executive committee also selects a chairperson.

Conflicts of interest are strictly controlled. But, of course, members of the executive committee have an indispensable understanding of the funding process and the politics involved. Their ability to influence, even indirectly, the outcome of decisions made by SAC is critically important.

According to current chairwoman and College senior Natalie Vernon, SAC is “by student groups, for student groups.” But Parliamentary Debate, which has 45 student participants including Vernon, received $11,061 of funding this year, the sixth-largest amount and dramatically more per student than most other groups.

By student groups, for student groups, indeed.

To put it simply, SAC doesn’t directly serve the students’ interests and creates funding inequities. Given how its decisions touch almost every undergraduate at Penn, this is unacceptable.

SAC received $823,511 from the Undergraduate Assembly for the current academic year. It has distributed $583,296, or roughly $60 for each undergraduate, to student groups. The remainder has been apportioned to the Performing Arts Council, set aside for the fall and spring Student Activities Fairs or held in contingency funds.

In a crude analysis of this academic year’s allocations, I found that some groups receive disproportionately more funding than others.

Take two examples. Parliamentary Debate is receiving approximately $250 per member. Mock Trial receives $320 per member.

At the other end of the range, Penn Political Review receives $130 per member. And Penn Appetit, the student food magazine, receives about $100 per member.

Mock Trial and Penn Parli require significantly more funding because of travel and tournament fees — they are more expensive activities. But publications are accessible to all students in a way that most groups are not — see the dilemma?

It is evident that some students are financing the enrichment of other students’ college experience. But Penn is not Obamerica, where some people get fleeced for the “greater good.” The fees we pay to the University should not be redistributed so unequally.

Here is a radical but elegant solution: Let students decide, directly. We could accomplish this with a voucher system. Give each student $60, split across two semesters, to allocate to groups as he or she sees fit.Student groups would compete, in a marketplace, for dollars. And only those that are successful would continue to exist.

A SAC would still exist to play an administrative role, oversee spending and provide supplementary funds as needed. But its members — and its chairman — should be democratically elected to guarantee students’ interests are respected.

While the UA absorbs itself in yet another meaningless, largely symbolic “reform” — replacing the position of UA chairperson with a democratically elected student body president — students wait for the sort of change that could actually make a difference.

David Lei is a Wharton senior from Brooklyn, NY. He is the former executive editor of the DP and the executive director of College Republicans. His e-mail address is lei@dailypennsylvanian.com

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