Where Does the Money Go?
Fee covers more than most students think

By Mike Caputo

Attending Rider may be expensive, but a student’s financial statement includes a valuable charge that turns out to be a bargain – the Student Activities Fee (SAF).

Administrators and student leaders have complained that the Rider community does not appreciate how much the Student Activities Fee provides. The SAF (listed on the financial statement as SGA [Student Government Association] Fee), is one flat fee of $125 a semester, up from $100 a semester last year.

Instead of breaking down costs for activities at Rider, the University charges its students the SAF. The fee encompasses, among other things, clubs and organizations with budgets, popular events such as Bronc Buffets, the Student Entertainment Council (SEC) Concerts and even SEC Movies in the Bart Luedeke Center (BLC) Theatre. Junior SGA Treasurer Frank Zuccarini said that students commonly mix up the SAF with the cost of tuition.

“Many students don’t realize that it is only the $125 that they are actually paying for all these events,” he said. “They think that it’s coming out of the $32,000, when really that’s what you’re paying to attend class, to live here — things like that.”

The SAF provides the funds for fixed expenses like the pub and the fitness center fees, but there are also many other places that the money has to be appropriated to: security at events, club sports, cultural and Bronc Buffet programming. Furthermore, the SAF funds the budgets of over 50 clubs and organizations and offers spontaneous funding for those without a budget.

“We leave the spontaneous number out for those organizations for those that want to come up during the year who didn’t have a budget and want some money,” said Zuccarini.

Since the SAF involves a large amount of money, there is an entire organization dedicated toward it: the Finance Board, a student-run organization on the Lawrenceville campus.

“There is an elaborate process and a great deal of work that goes into properly allocating the money and where it goes,” said Resident Finance Board Seat Glenn Kasper.

According to junior Finance Board Chair Erica Stout, decisions made within the Finance Board are fair towards the direct and indirect recipients on campus.

“We look at each proposal and each budget as if everything is equal,” said Stout. “We use the same criteria and we judge an event, conference, capital expenditure, or budget on whether it is going to be good for the campus and if it’s going to be good use of the money.”

Stout said that one of the goals of the Finance Board, which holds open general meetings every Wednesday, this year is to make the organization known and to inform the student body to what the SAF is.

“It would be amazing for people to see that SEC movies and Bronc Buffets are funded by SAF,” said Stout. “Even some speakers are partially funded by it. People see that, but don’t put the connection that ‘oh that is my money.’”