CLUBS TO RECEIVE NO SPRING FUNDING

James Kelly

He/Him

News Editor

2/11/25

Student clubs and organizations will receive $0 in spring allocations, Plymouth State Student Senate Treasurer Walter Farrar announced on Monday. The move follows lower-than-expected enrollment for the spring semester, according to Student Life Director Jessica Dutille. “We were hopeful that we would generate more revenue through the student activity fee,” she said. “Enrollment is down, which is why we don’t have additional funds.”

Historically, Student Life has awarded club allocations on a yearly basis in the fall. Anticipating low enrollment, Student Life announced at an August 27th meeting that allocations for the 2024/2025 school year would be awarded by semester. Clubs and organizations were given fall funding with the expectation that a second round of allocations would arrive in the spring.

Instead, many clubs have been caught off guard by the fact that their fall funding was, in fact, funding for the whole year. “If we had known at the start of the year that our allocations would’ve actually ended up being for the entire year and not just the fall semester, we definitely would have budgeted differently,” said Corey Baker, who is president of both Vocal Order and the Plymouth State Paranormal Research Club.

“PSPR really enjoys participating in cohosting Bingo and PSNL, and we were planning on dipping into our own funds to get better prizes and catering for these events,” Baker said, “but it doesn’t seem like we’ll be able to do that anymore.” The lack of funding will also prevent anticipated spending on merchandise and travel, he added. 

For PSU Poets and Writers, the absence of a spring allocation may mean no Centripetal, the organization’s semesterly publication, said Treasurer Makenna Horne. ”We rely on the funding that the university provides us.” For Horne, the news was a shock. “They told us that we would certainly get some money in the Spring,” she said.

According to Dutille, fall allocations were determined based on anticipated student fee revenue for both the fall and spring semesters. That means any potential spring allocations would have been heavily driven by transfer enrollment. And though there were students who transferred in for the spring semester, there were also students who transferred out. With spring fee revenue already spent, and no additional revenue from transfers, clubs were left with a goose egg. “All funds have been released,” PSSS advisor Joshua Chandler said.

At the same time, PSSS is facing a small and shrinking Conferences, Events, and Activities (CEA) fund, which sits at about $7,000 following a $2,950 award to the Technical Theater Experience Club for a conference. Farrar anticipates some $20,000 more in requests this semester. 

PSSS began the school year with just over $19,000 in CEA funds. The spring CEA budget comprises about $10,000 in rollover funds from the fall, but no new spring money. As recently as October 28th, PSSS anticipated another $20,000 would be added to the CEA budget for spring requests, according to then-speaker Will Loughlin. “That number came from Student Life, and we operated our finances in the fall based on that number, as we have very year,” he said. That money never came.