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ACP Forums
This is an archived ACP Forums thread.
Student Government Funding
Jacob Singh, 12/2/2005, 3:03:16 AM
Hi,
We've recently launched a student paper (currently funded by the editors) and have met with some pretty stiff resistance from the Student Government and to a lesser extent administration.
We attend a California Community College and we know we are totally within our rights, did not violate libel laws, etc. We just had an editorial very critical of the student government. Now we're trying to reconcile, because we don't want to go underground and have to get ad money. We're obviously not going to buckle on editorial control, but our government (ASVC) has 43K of money for a campus with only 6 active student groups and we think we deserve our piece. They know that state law prohibits them from censoring us whether they fund it or not, but can we force them to fund us?
- Crazy in California
Responses
, 12/2/2005, 12:19:10 PM
Remember being funded by student government opens up a whole new can of worms. I would seriously reconsider your stance against advertising revenue. One or two really good semester-long sponsors could cover most of your costs.
Rob V.
Red & Black Adviser
Washington & Jefferson College
Andrew Welfle, 12/5/2005, 8:28:24 PM
Wait... I thought you said that your paper was funded by the editors. Are they also on Student Government?
My newspaper is funded through ads and through circulation fees that is allocated through the student government. We do depend on those allocations, but we also make it clear that they aren't doing a favor by allocating those funds, students are paying that fee for subscriptions to our newspaper, as well as other publications on campus.
I'm not entirely sure how the setup at your university works, but I think that as long as you stay steadfast on journalistic ethics, if they push any harder, you have a case to bring up to the administration.
Good luck to you!
-Andrew Welfle
The Communicator
Ashley Robertson, 1/2/2006, 12:03:14 AM
I have to agree with Rob on your advertising revenue stance. That's a major part of any newspaper and just as he stated, it wouldn't take much to cover your costs.
My newspaper serves a campus of 4000 students. Newspaper workshop is an acedemic class under the University's journalism program...Therefore, we receive $18,000 per year from the state to run cover our costs of operation.
However, selling advertising revenue allows us to give significant scholarships to staff and buy much needed equipment for publication. We gross around $12,000 a semester in sales and in the past three years have grown from a staff of 3 to a staff of 12 with over $10,000 worth of scholarships being awarded each semester. It's definately worth your time to sell your product!
Anyway, you're headed into dark waters if you allow your publication to owe SGA anything. However, if your SGA is like the one here, their entire budget comes from a "student activity fee" that each full time student pays at registration each semester. So, it's technically not money that belongs to SGA, it belongs to the student body.
If this is the case there, you could petition students to convince administration to reallocate some of those funds towards a student newspaper. You would be surprised how quickly they tend to listen when you can show that it's truly something that students want.
Hope this helps. Sorry for the novel.
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