SGB hosts last meeting of the school year 

In the last meeting of the school year, Student Government Board President Ryan Young said his final farewell to the board. 

“This organization has meant so much to me. It has changed my life and was the most meaningful thing I’ve ever done,” Young said. 

In this meeting, the board said goodbye to each other and the organization. In addition, the board passed the Allocations Policy and Procedures Task Force recommendations, with the goal of increasing the readability and accessibility of the allocations manual. 

Vice President of Operations Sarah Siddiqui said in December that the allocations task force was chartered to deliberate on the allocations section of the governing code. 

“We’re now overhauling the allocations manual, based on what the recommendations are by the Allocations Policy and Procedures Task Force,” Siddiqui said. 

One of the changes in the manual will allow for the allocations committee and governing board to defer a request instead of denying it, allowing the organization to resubmit the request in the future. The allocations committee will also be required to disclose all requests. 

“All of our decisions are public because we have a public meeting, but for the allocations committee itself, those votes, or at least what the allocation recommended, will be public,” Siddiqui said. 

After meeting with student leaders, Siddiqui said the manual will increase the cap on conference funding from $3,000 to $5,000 per year. 

“That was something that a lot of student organizations had asked for and something we wanted to meet for them,” Siddiqui said. “The cap on non-sports competition expenses increased from $5,000 to $6,000 per organization per fiscal year. The cap on recreational sports competition increased from $2,000 to $3,000 per organization per fiscal year.”

At last week’s meeting, Siddiqui said the board had an organization that expressed decreasing the speaker honorary cap to $20,000 from $30,000 per year felt limiting. After meeting with the organization, the cap would be decreased to $25,000 instead. 

“We met with them right after the public meeting and a couple days later because we wanted to work with them to find a solution that would be good,” Siddiqui said. “That was a direct result of communication that we had with student organizations and student leaders about what they wanted to see.” 

When organizations collaborate with the Pitt Program Council for funding, SGB funds 25% of the total cost. Siddiqui said the manual will increase SGB’s funding to 50%. 

“All of these decisions were made in our conversations with student leaders, because we really wanted this new allocations manual to be the best it could be for them and reflect what they wanted to see,” Siddiqui said. 

In addition, the manual will increase the cap for food expenses from $3 per person to $4 per person. 

“We learned from student organizations that were fairly limited. Now, expenses for food need to be educational and cultural benefits, plus they need to serve the primary purpose of the event,” Siddiqui said. 

Celebrating the last meeting, Board Member Katie Fitzpatrick said she was grateful for the opportunity given by Student Government. 

“I don’t think the student government stereotype is quite what everyone seems to think. I think that we are presented with a very unique opportunity to work on the issues and topics each of us are passionate about,” Fitzpatrick said. “We have the opportunity to bring some concerns and frustrations directly to administrators and work with them to find solutions.”

In addition to thanking her board members, Siddiqui said she wanted to thank the voters and students at Pitt. 

“You’re the reason why I do what I do every day. Truly to the voters and the students at Pitt, I hope I made you proud as VPO this year,” Siddiqui said. 

Concluding the meeting, Young said he wanted to thank everyone for an amazing year. 

“This has meant so much to me,” Young said. 

Allocations:

Pitt Sailbot requested $2,124.82 to attend a competition. The board approved this request in full. 

HOSA requested funds to attend a competition in Texas. The board amended and approved the request at $2,883.24.

Men’s ultimate frisbee requested funds to attend a competition. The board amended and approved the request at $2,336.97.

Pitt Rowing Team requested funds to attend a competition. Due to time constraints, the board asynchronously approved the amount of $12,500.