Large Operating Budget’ Not for All

by Simpsonian Staff

As many of you know the Student Government Association voted on budget requests almost a week before students arrived on campus, leaving freshmen and groups that wanted to make changes to their budget out of the loop.

It also did not fund several groups that asked for money, which left SGA with more than $50,000 to play with this year. It says that groups can request to use this money, but only if the group is hosting a campus-wide event and prefers if the event is related to the 150th celebration.

It’s great that SGA is trying to be more conservative with whom it gives money and what that money is used for. We’re all for funding a few extra 150th events, but how much extra money is too much?

The Zenith, KSTM radio station and The Simpsonian were some of the groups that did not receive funding this year from SGA. One student senator in SGA dubbed The Simpsonian as “self-sustaining.”

We would like to eventually be self-sustaining through advertisement sales, but we’re not there yet.

We understand that not everyone can be funded by SGA because there isn’t enough money to go around, but The Simpsonian is still a student-run organization, and should still be funded under the SGA finance code.

Anyone is able to sign up for the class either as a writer, photographer or in advertising. We even accept freelance articles from students not registered in the class.

Some would argue that it takes a certain talent to write articles for the paper that not everyone knows. That problem doesn’t occur to us.

You don’t know what AP Style is? We can teach you. You aren’t sure how to approach someone like President Byrd for an interview? We can show you. Just because you haven’t written a news story before doesn’t mean that you can’t help out at The Simpsonian.

We appreciate all that SGA does for Simpson College, but think that if it has enough money to give to drumlines and Dippin’ Dots it should have enough money to fund the media at Simpson College.