2008 Woodie Awards
SAFC reveals methods behind decison-making
Issue date: 4/24/08 Section: Campus News
Wondering how the SAFC decided on some figures this year? Read on.
Why does the SAFC round numbers up or down?
"I think all in all it's just about the math. It's just easier not to get into the small… Because not only does that create another level of intricacy, but then that level becomes another level, and it just gets a lot messier than it needs to be. So we just round off by the nearest ten if we can, if not the nearest dollar," said Perez.
How did the SAFC choose to increase the funding of ASUWT positions? It looks like the President and Vice-President positions got pretty big raises.
What we decided to do was to normalize all the wages for every student position on campus at $10 per hour. Ands then we multiplied that by the number of hours, and then we found out that the president and vice-president were way underpaid in relation to all the positions we were funding on campus. All the positions are normalized at $10 an hour. In the application form and the job description, it gives the minimum number of hours, and then we just multiply $10 by that. We wanted to make sure that it was high enough that everyone could survive, but that [every staff member] was being paid equally.
"[We factored in] the hours that they were working, and then they were showing us positions on other campuses, and of course [people on other campuses] all got paid way more… Actually what we did was [we took] the hours that they worked, and then took the $10 an hour, and figured it out with the 12.5 percent benefit. And that's what it came out to," Coates said.
The ASUWT team will also receive twice the per diem and travel expenses they had this year, because they travel to Seattle and Olympia frequently. Also, a student lobbyist tends to travel with them-and "that person was not really funded before," Coates said.
Why did Student Life ask for $62,400 for the Coordinator for Student Leadership? I didn't know that position even existed.
"They're restructuring their whole Student Life, it's a whole new bureaucracy structure… The coordinator, that right now I believe is the position that Shanna Kinzel is doing right now… We wanted to see positions, how much they're asking for… But we couldn't do it that way because they were changing positions and adding positions," Coates said.
"I remember those pieces being a point of contention for me because I felt like those positions were redundant. I felt like they did a lot of things that a lot of the other positions were supposed to do," Perez said.
Why were only three SAFC members in favor of the intramural sports proposal?
"We felt that they may not always be in the same place," Coates said. Right now the Longshoremen's Hall and the intramural sports program keep their equipment in the same place. "But as the campus grows, intramural sports may be, say, at the top of the hill where we might have a park. And they're going to need stuff up there, and the Longshoremen's Hall or Fitness Center might be down here," Coates said.
Perez wanted both the Longshoremen's Hall and intramural sports to combine their funds in buying equipment, since they're currently in the same place. If they combined, "We could save money on paying the staffing as well," he said.
"I think that the decisions we made were in line with the five-year plan and were the best that we could do with the funds that we had for students," Coates said.
Why does the SAFC round numbers up or down?
"I think all in all it's just about the math. It's just easier not to get into the small… Because not only does that create another level of intricacy, but then that level becomes another level, and it just gets a lot messier than it needs to be. So we just round off by the nearest ten if we can, if not the nearest dollar," said Perez.
How did the SAFC choose to increase the funding of ASUWT positions? It looks like the President and Vice-President positions got pretty big raises.
What we decided to do was to normalize all the wages for every student position on campus at $10 per hour. Ands then we multiplied that by the number of hours, and then we found out that the president and vice-president were way underpaid in relation to all the positions we were funding on campus. All the positions are normalized at $10 an hour. In the application form and the job description, it gives the minimum number of hours, and then we just multiply $10 by that. We wanted to make sure that it was high enough that everyone could survive, but that [every staff member] was being paid equally.
"[We factored in] the hours that they were working, and then they were showing us positions on other campuses, and of course [people on other campuses] all got paid way more… Actually what we did was [we took] the hours that they worked, and then took the $10 an hour, and figured it out with the 12.5 percent benefit. And that's what it came out to," Coates said.
The ASUWT team will also receive twice the per diem and travel expenses they had this year, because they travel to Seattle and Olympia frequently. Also, a student lobbyist tends to travel with them-and "that person was not really funded before," Coates said.
Why did Student Life ask for $62,400 for the Coordinator for Student Leadership? I didn't know that position even existed.
"They're restructuring their whole Student Life, it's a whole new bureaucracy structure… The coordinator, that right now I believe is the position that Shanna Kinzel is doing right now… We wanted to see positions, how much they're asking for… But we couldn't do it that way because they were changing positions and adding positions," Coates said.
"I remember those pieces being a point of contention for me because I felt like those positions were redundant. I felt like they did a lot of things that a lot of the other positions were supposed to do," Perez said.
Why were only three SAFC members in favor of the intramural sports proposal?
"We felt that they may not always be in the same place," Coates said. Right now the Longshoremen's Hall and the intramural sports program keep their equipment in the same place. "But as the campus grows, intramural sports may be, say, at the top of the hill where we might have a park. And they're going to need stuff up there, and the Longshoremen's Hall or Fitness Center might be down here," Coates said.
Perez wanted both the Longshoremen's Hall and intramural sports to combine their funds in buying equipment, since they're currently in the same place. If they combined, "We could save money on paying the staffing as well," he said.
"I think that the decisions we made were in line with the five-year plan and were the best that we could do with the funds that we had for students," Coates said.
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