What would you say if part of your student fees helped to fund the local Pagan society? What about if they supported Christian-right groups on campus?

Currently, this is not the case, as Eastern is one of the few universities in the country not to use student fees to fund student groups. But some students argue that to foster more diversity in intellectual thought, Eastern needs to play a more active role in funding Recognized Student Organizations on campus.

Under Eastern’s current hands-off policy, many student groups have little or no money to inform the student body that they even exist.

“Most of the student body doesn’t know we’re here,” said Ashley Kiefer, president of the Society of Metaphysical Advancement, one of 132 RSOs on campus.

SOMA is a religious Earth-based spirituality group that gives Pagans on campus a place to meet, talk and worship, Kiefer said.

As the Pagan religion maintains the Earth is a spiritual body, SOMA also promotes the idea that people need to take care of the planet, she said

However, it’s hard to promote SOMA’s message of environmentalism without money.

Like every other RSO, Kiefer’s group has to rely on outside donations for funding. The obscurity of the group, though, means few donations are made to SOMA. Since so few donations are made, SOMA cannot afford to advertise to lift itself out of obscurity.

“A lot of people don’t know that SOMA exists simply on the basis that we have no funding to do even basic advertising,” Kiefer said. “It’s frustrating.”

She said if SOMA had money, members would sponsor environmental projects, such as campus cleanups and forums to educate the student body about Paganism.

But while student groups such as SOMA can only dream of having enough money to organize these events, similar groups on other college campuses are provided with the funds they need to promote their cause.

The Church of All Worlds Student Organization, a Pagan student group at the University of Wisconsin – Madison, is hard at work planning community events such as an Earth Day tree-planting event.

Gail Love, facilitator of the Madison group, which has about 25 members, said the Associated Students of Madison, the University of Wisconsin’s student government, awarded her $100 to spend on flyers to spread around campus, as well as another $100 to place four advertisements in the local student newspaper.

“It would have made it more difficult to do what we’re doing (without the donation),” Love said.

Creating `A Marketplace of Ideas’

Eastern is one of only a few schools in the country that does not give money to student organizations, said Ali Fischer, president of the U.S. Student Association, the nation’s largest national student organization.

“Most universities, especially public ones, have a student fee-funded body that allocates money to student groups,” Fischer said.

However, Eastern’s fee-funded bodies such as the Apportionment Board and the Student Senate, expressively ban any donations to RSOs.

The AB, a group of students and faculty in charge of distributing student fees, banned donations to any party not affiliated with the AB. Last week, the Student Senate passed a bylaw change forbidding the donation of Student Government funds to any person, activity, organization or department.

Senate members said it was not Student Government’s job to fund RSOs.

“Student fees are not designed to support the activities of RSOs on campus,”

said Senate Speaker Adam Weyhaupt. “It’s not our responsibility,” he said. “(RSOs) are the life of the students, but that doesn’t mean that every student should fund them.”

Mike Dean, chair of the Associated Students of Madison, disagrees. He

encourages student groups around the country to press for their rights to be awarded student fees.

Dean said the Associated Students of Madison funds over 600 student groups, and the result is “a marketplace of ideas” on the University of Wisconsin campus.

“Without (student government) funds, student groups would not be able to create this diversity on campus,” he said.

Dean said without student government support, groups would have to go to

local corporations and businesses for money.

However, as local businesses only fund groups with certain ideologies, such a system wouldn’t create a diversity of ideas on college campuses, he said.

“We would only get certain ideas, and that wouldn’t be beneficial to anyone,” Dean said.

Fischer said she agreed with Dean and added that Eastern’s current system of forcing RSOs to rely on outside funding leaves student groups such as SOMA “at the mercy of the market.”

“The money goes to what would be more popular,” Fischer said. “It’s easier for the cheerleading squad to get money than for, say, the campus’ gay and lesbian rights group.

“(The senate is) saying, ‘We’re going to let the discrimination in society dictate who gets the money,'” she said.

Weyhaupt said the idea that forcing student organizations to solicit the

community for money does not restrict the diversity of the organizations on campus.

“Take a look at the RSO rosters – we have a very diverse selection of RSOs,”Weyhaupt said. “RSOs do an incredible job of putting on programs and activities without student fees,” he said.

Funding At What Price?

Many RSO members favor the use of student fees to support their activities.

“In general principle it sounds like a good idea,” said Monica Strazzante,

president of two RSOs: the Circle of Wisdom (a philosophy club), and the Astronomy club.

Right now, Strazzante said, the only benefit of applying for RSO status is an increase in advertising opportunities.

“You can put stuff in ‘Campus Clips’ (in The Daily Eastern News) and apply to put up fliers,” she said. “It sounds like there should be some more (to being a RSO) than that.”

“I know almost every RSO would be thrilled to get some extra money,” said

Nicole Kohlbecker, a freshman elementary education major.

Kohlbecker, who is not a member of any RSO, said there also is a possibility that more people would want to start more RSOs if they received university funding.

But, if Eastern did decide to allocate money to RSOs, the bill for supporting the groups would likely be handed directly to students in the form of an increase in student fees.

Bill Archer, the undergraduate student body president of Southern Illinois University – Carbondale, said each SIU student is charged $18.50 per semester to fund student groups on the SIU campus. This rate will soon jump to $34 to help pay for campus safety and a day care, as well as non-RSO activities such as hiring guest speakers and artists, he said.

Wisconsin students paid over $26 per semester toward student organization funding during the 1999-2000 school year.