Changes to Societies Funding

For the 2010-11 academic year, there will be some changes in how Societies Federation (Socs Fed) and individual societies are funded. This page details what these changes are, how they will work, and why they are being implemented. If you have any questions about the information on this page please email the Societies Officer.

There are also going to be some slight changes to the recognition and derecognition of societies. Check out the derecognition page for more info.

Quick personal message: Please bear in mind that societies are not being singled out as a new source for funding for the SU. Most of you will be very aware of our current financial position and that we are undergoing a huge restructure at the moment in order to reduce costs across the board. Please don't forget that this has involved several redundancies, and try to keep this in context. This process has involved some very difficult decisions that I did not want to make, and it's not a nice job having to tell you about the changes, but these changes are essential to allow the SU to run societies as it currently does, and I hope you can recognise that.

James (Socs Officer '09/10)

Why?

Socs Fed is the part of the Students' Union which all the societies come under. To join any other societies you have to join Socs Fed first (with a few exceptions - more on that below). All of the membership money from Socs Fed goes into a big pot which is used solely to help societies. It goes to things like:

• Money dished out during the annual budgeting process
• The Emergency Fund
• Purchasing equipment for Socs Fed which all societies can use (like the digital camera, megaphone and first aid kits)
• The Societies Awards and the Awards Party
• Covering the costs for Societies Fair and Refreshers Fair

Currently, societies cost the SU a very significant chunk of money which is not covered by any income from Socs Fed or societies. This includes:

• The Societies Officer
• The Resources Room facilities (from the computers down to the physical space (i.e. part of the rent which we pay to the University for the SU building).
• Other direct support staff (the Student Activities and Development Manager and the staff who work in the Resources Room)
• Indirect staff time (including staff in the Finance Office, Facilities and Safety, Ents, F&B and more)
• Processing bank transactions

and the list goes on.

With the current financial difficulties being faced by everybody, including your SU, we have been forced to look at every way possible to reduce costs and increase income. Whilst examining everything we do, one thing that was looked at was the societies funding scheme in general. These changes are the result of this examination and discussion.

What?

We have introduced a new model for Socs Fed and Societies to help recover just a small amount of the costs associated with running societies. Obviously, we absolutely wanted to keep the costs for students who want to get involved as low as possible (whilst still needing to cover some of our costs), so hopefully the changes below reflect that.

There are two key aspects to the changes:

1. Retaining some of the Socs Fed Fee: As of next year, the SU will retain a third of the Socs Fed membership fee in order to pay for some of the costs mentioned above. This will be approximately £20 000, still leaving £40 000 to be given out to societies during the budgeting process. A lot of you guys already thought we did this (we just needed to look at the results of the Big 5 Survey to find that out), and hopefully most of you guys will recognise that in order to run societies we need to recover some of our costs.
There are a couple of additional changes being made to Socs Fed which should make it easier to join, especially if you want to join part-way through the year:
• Multiple-year memberships will stop being offered, giving students the opportunity to decide whether they want to join every year of their degree or not. This also makes it much easier for students who have a year abroad to just join for the years for which they are actually here. Please note that those students who already have a multi-year membership will be able to keep that membership until it expires.
• Memberships will last for three terms rather than until the end of the year, so if you join in term 2 (at Refreshers Fair, for example) then your membership will expire at the end of term 1 of the following year. This makes it easier for Postgraduates whose courses don't start in October, and for students who have a term out of Uni (e.g. those who go to Venice for term 1).
2. Taking £1 from every Society Membership: Starting in October, £1 from every Society Membership will be retained by the Students' Union in order to cover some more costs. This also means that those societies with more members (which generally do more and therefore cost us more) contribute slightly more to the SU, which kinda makes sense. This also (rather obviously) means that there will be a minimum society membership fee of £1 introduced (although see again the section on exceptions to this below).

What does this mean?

So we're introducing some changes, but what will that actually mean for you guys?

The first thing to say is that we worked hard at making these changes have as little impact on students and societies as possible whilst still raising a sufficient amount of money. The reason we used a combination of the two approaches above was so that there would still be plenty in the pot for society budgets and the direct cost to students (i.e. the Society membership fees themselves) was kept to a minimum. This was definitely a very difficult decision which needed a lot of discussion, thought, and talking to you guys.

Impact for society execs

If you're on an exec for a society, then there will be a couple things you may need to think about:

• In your budget application, you may get a little less than last year; basically we are likely to be less generous than before when covering things which you can reasonably expect your members to pay for - transport being a good example. However, you should still get some money for most of the things you applied which you would reasonably expect us to help fund, so don't worry too much about it!
• £1 from every membership fee which used to go to you guys is now not going to. As an exec, try thinking about whether you need to raise your membership fees by 50p or £1 to cover that. You may actually decide that you don't need the £1 amounts that you're going to lose, and keep your membership fee as it is.

Impact for students who are society members

You should hopefully notice very little difference in your experience of societies. There may be a couple of things which do happen:

• Some of the societies you're in may raise their memberships by 50p or £1. This is to maintain the income to the society even though £1 from your membership will go to the SU. But let's face it, a change from £2.50 to £3 is hardly going to break the bank now, is it?
• You just might notice that a small amount of the society's activity costs are passed on to you guys, the members, when they weren't before. This should be a very small amount because the funding hasn't stopped, it has just gone down in amount by a bit.

Exceptions

Some societies are currently exempt from the Socs Fed Fee - i.e. one does not have to join Socs Fed in order to become a member of them. These have to apply annually at the start of the year for their exemption to be renewed. These are usually welfare societies. All of these societies (along with any new applicants) will have to apply for their exemption as usual at the start of the year. At the same time, we will invite applications from societies to apply for exemption from the £1 minimum membership fee. The criteria for exemption here will be similar to those for Socs Fed exemption.

Please bear in mind that exemption from the Socs Fed Fee this year does NOT guarantee exemption from either the minimum £1 joining fee OR the Socs Fed fee for next year. Make sure you apply for exemption in good time if you want it!