When Student Association announced its new tier system to fund programming for student organizations, the editors of Jerk and Zipped magazines were concerned about how the success of their publications would be judged.

Under the new tier system, organizations are funded based on their prior programming experience. But the system neglected to include any specific details on publications.

Gregory Miller and Molly Gallagher, editors in chief of Jerk and Zipped, respectively, said their concerns were validated after receiving the Finance Board’s recommendations — not because they were not fully funded, but because they feel the budget process for publications as a whole is inadequate. 

‘The main issue here is that SA isn’t making any attempt to reform the budget process,’ said Miller, also a staff writer for The Daily Orange. 

Student publications interested in receiving funding from SA must provide the Finance Board with at least three requests, including things like more funding, more copies or more color pages. Of these three requests, one must be the same as what was funded the previous semester. A fiscal agent must also attend a budget hearing. 

The Finance Board determines how much money to allocate to student publications partially based on success, but mostly based on how many students are involved with the planning and execution of the publication, said SA Comptroller Jeff Rickert. Finance Board members also read the publications as part of the evaluation to see how they relate to students, he said.

Rickert said 12 publications were funded by SA this semester and that it is important for editors to realize their magazines do not apply to everyone on campus. He said he didn’t know how students could read 12 publications and that the campus has reached its saturation point. 

But student publications Jerk and Zipped are not satisfied with this process.

With the new tier system, organizations that hold programs, such as University Union, have a chance to receive more money as they prove their ability to host successful events. But editors feel publications that prove to be successful and well read do not have the same opportunity. 

‘There’s a lot of hypocrisy there,’ Miller said. 

This budget season, Jerk requested funding for 5,000 copies, which is 1,000 more than the request from last budget season. This increase was based on a readership survey and the speed with which copies typically run out each month, Miller said. The Finance Board rejected the request, stating Jerk was ‘already the largest publication on campus, printing 4,000 copies per issue, and they also have a large Web presence.’ 

‘They’re handicapping us,’ Miller said. ‘We already meet the needs of what we have, and they’re not making any attempt to understand our position.’

Miller has emailed both Rickert and SA President Neal Casey, explaining his case and offering to have an open dialogue about how to improve the budget process after the budget meeting two weeks ago. Neither Rickert nor Casey responded to the email.

Molly Gallagher, editor in chief of Zipped, agrees SA has not been recognizing student publications that have gone ‘above and beyond.’

SA needs to take publications’ use of social media and advertising into account when distributing money, Gallagher said. 

‘There are publications who aren’t doing this, who aren’t active on Facebook and Twitter,’ she said. ‘The Student Association doesn’t seem to be recognizing student publications that are doing that.’

Both Miller and Gallagher said SA should develop a campus-wide survey or a better evaluation process to determine what publications are most familiar to students. 

‘They have to look at the whole package,’ Gallagher said. ‘They have to look at events, they have to look at staff members across campus, they have to look at social media.’

Although Jerk and Zipped would like to see a reformed budget process that would support the growth of publications, other editors — including Kirsten Acuna of Medley magazine, Danielle Emig of The Student Voice, Samantha Lifson of Medusa Magazine, and Meredith Popolo of Equal Time magazine — said they are satisfied with the system. 

Acuna, editor in chief of Medley, has no problems with SA’s budget process, but said SA needs to understand why publications are becoming digitalized because there are reasons behind it. 

‘They see we’re putting it up, so they think they don’t have to fund for more,’ she said. 

One reason Acuna puts Medley online is because there are not enough issues for everyone on campus, she said. It also gives incoming freshmen and alumni who are not on campus a chance to see the magazine. 

Another concern regarding the budget process is the number of new student publications appearing on campus. This semester, two new magazines came to campus, which concerned some people, including Kathleen Corlett, editor in chief of What the Health magazine. 

When SA announced the new tier system, Corlett was not concerned, but the news about two new publications on campus made her worry about budget cuts to already existing magazines. She decided to apply for the same number of issues as last semester because she was afraid to get denied, she said.

Popolo, editor in chief of Equal Time, said she had the same concern and suggested SA offer more money toward publications, but didn’t know what else SA could do. 

In early February, Rickert planned to meet with Melissa Chessher, chair of the magazine department, to discuss a way to allocate money to student publications and determine what makes them successful. The meeting was canceled, and another has yet to be rescheduled. 

Rickert said if the Finance Board were to create a system based on success, ‘we would have to award certain ones and punish others, and in punishing others, we would have to get rid of some.’ 

Chessher said SA could look into the following when distributing funds to publications: awards a publication receives and how many; operations through advertising; a diverse staff from schools across campus; if they have ways to measure their audience via social media; if they have an online presence; and what services they bring to campus. 

Whether or not a magazine is launching or has sustained itself is also a factor to take into account, Chessher said. Newer magazines should have a trial period in which there should be limited copies and distribution that allow for the chance to succeed. There should be ‘a range and a thought behind the amount of funding’ distributed to a magazine after the first year, she said. 

‘I love that there’s this robust marketplace of ideas, but I think there needs to be a finer evaluation measure about how magazines are sustained and given the opportunity to prove themselves,’ Chessher said.

It is not only the improvements SA should make that need to be taken into consideration, but what publications can do as well, said Acuna, editor in chief of Medley. 

She said: ‘I think both sides need to meet in the middle somewhere.’

lgleveil@syr.edu

Published on April 26, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Laurence: lgleveil@syr.edu | @lgleveille