By Kayla Tucker – Managing Editor
Students approved the Student Alliance budget for 2015-16. This budget is funded by Grand Rapids Community College students’ payment of their “student activity fee,” which is accounted for in tuition each semester.
Students with eight credits or less pay a $5 fee and students with nine or more credits pay a $10 fee.
The budget was created with an expected enrollment loss of 11.7 percent. These numbers updated this week to 5.8 percent but the budget was not updated to reflect these numbers. Student Alliance plans on allocating any extra money outside of what was budgeted to go into an “extra allocations” fund. Student clubs and organizations are then able to petition for the extra money.
A final enrollment count will be done next week, and the numbers will be finalized then.
Zachary Grice, 21, president of the Student Gamers Association at GRCC, moved to pass the budget proposal.
“I saw that the numbers looked right,” Grice said. “I understand that the budget cuts need to happen.”
A new student in the crowd, Jack Vangessel, 18, of East Grand Rapids, believes that more students and community leaders should be attending meetings like this.
Vangessel just started his first semester at the college, and recently joined the GRCC College Republicans.
“I’m a part of GRCC and my interests are their interests and their interests are my interests,” Vangessel said. “They’re making decisions for me, so I’d like to at least have some sort of insight on it.”
The Student Alliance meets every other Thursday at 2 p.m. in the multi-purpose room on the second floor of the Student Center.
Yikes. Who’s writing this garbage?