After financial auditors uncovered problems in the Associated Student Body’s clubs’ fund after the 2013-14 school year, the actions ASB has taken to ensure the legitimacy of student clubs and their budgets are justified and necessary to ensure that clubs run efficiently from year to year.
With the reinstatement of clubs in the 2014-15 school year after contract negotiations were settled last year, ASB enacted new regulations to ensure each club is tracking an organized budget. Each club is now required to submit a club renewal form, by-laws, roster, budget and signature card. The budget form outlines each club’s projected use of expenses for the year.
The main purpose of conducting annual audits is to keep organizations from having a poor fiscal policy. Although ASB should have had a sound policy last year, events such as teacher negotiations prevented clubs from having advisors, and starting the 2013-14 school year without an accountant made it difficult to do so. Therefore, the actions ASB has taken to ensure that clubs are managing their budgets are practical and respectable.
The statewide Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team manual requires all clubs to develop an annual budget that estimates revenues, expenses and carryover. After clubs create these budgets, each school’s student council is required to approve each club budget. Utilizing these forms, such as the club renewal form, to compile the necessary information for clubs to continue during the following year is an effective way to ensure that clubs truly have an impact on Costa students.
According to ASB advisor Lisa Claypoole, some clubs that were reinstated this year, such as S-Club, were unaware of the money that had already been carried over into their bank accounts from previous years. She claims that this is partially because club presidents who graduate fail to inform new club presidents of necessary information to continue the club. Having a new process to clean up the budget and work toward a sound fiscal policy as established by the FCMAT manual is a step in the right direction.
In addition to the new renewal packets, each club will now have a folder that will contain information that can be used to transfer club information from year to year. This implementation is a more systematic approach to ensure that budgetary information is passed on effectively and will ensure that clubs are more organized and fiscally accountable.
ASB is also suggesting this year that clubs only carry over amounts within the range of $200 to $500 into the next year, depending on how much money the club needs to use throughout the year and how many club members there are. However, allowing more than the allotted amount of funds to be carried over into the next year should be permitted if clubs have a specific, outlined plan for using additional funds in the future.
According to ASB Co-Commissioner of Clubs Paulina Welk, students often create clubs to simply place them on their college application. ASB counteracts this by holding “auditions” for students who want to begin new clubs to eliminate those with no set goals. This system is an effective way to ensure that clubs are used for a constructive purpose and are not simply created to embellish students’ college applications.
ASB’s enactment of new mechanisms to regulate clubs and their budgets on campus is necessary to establish fiscal legitimacy for ASB and the school.
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