Every person develops their own place on campus. I’ve found my home primarily in The Stute, Lodge, and the Student Government Association. In each organization, I’ve held many different roles, but in every case, I eventually ended up the same role: managing the finances for the organization. I’ve served as the Business Manager for The Stute for about two and a half years, served on the Budget and Audit Committees of the SGA for about a year, and have been the Treasurer for the Lodge since the beginning of the semester.
There are many intricacies in serving as treasurer of an organization. I’ll start off with Recognized Student Organization (RSO) guidelines — the guidelines with which most people are familiar. The SGA sets a long list of requirements for RSOs to follow. These range from the maximum number of events to limiting what organizations can spend funding on. If you don’t follow these guidelines, your budget will be cut. If you don’t have a “good” reason for items being on your budget, your budget will be cut. Treasurers have to be prepared. Sitting in the front of the room with 20 sets of eyes staring into your soul makes the semesterly budget meeting intimidating.
Second, treasurers have to be diligent and follow Student Life policies. You have to submit an order on time, give back the p-card in time, and upload receipts in a timely manner. Don’t follow these policies? Oh well.
It’s hard to quantify the work a treasurer puts into an organization until you’ve seen it first hand. While the work isn’t necessarily time-consuming, treasurers of an organization need to be up-to-date on all of the rules. It takes time to become familiar with these guidelines. Once you’ve sat down read the rules enough to understand them, the role of the treasurer is fairly straightforward — but it still takes time to learn. Getting past that initial hurdle is difficult.
I began serving on the Senate Budget Committee at the beginning of this year. From my time on the committee, as well as the audit committee, and by talking to executive board members of other organizations, I’ve seen organizations struggle solely because of their treasurers. While the entire e-board needs to work together for an organization to succeed, a poor treasurer can bring down an organization single-handedly. While a president stands out more as a requirement for success, the role of the treasurer is typically reserved for someone with previous executive board experience. A first-time e-board member may not be trusted to serve as treasurer. The financial responsibilities of being the treasurer compound with the struggles of serving on the executive board for the first time. It’s a challenge.
My first e-board position was Business Manager of The Stute. I didn’t understand what I was budgeting for, nor did I really understand the responsibilities. Slowly, I learned. Thankfully, because The Stute did not host events at the time, it wasn’t a rush to learn policy (I only had to learn how to defend our printing costs). I could focus on acclimating myself to the responsibilities of serving on an executive board. From this, I developed my niche and my expertise as treasurer of an organization.
Initially, finances are challenging. Once that hurdle is surpassed, being treasurer is a great, “lax” e-board role — and it’s an accomplishment: an accomplishment that you can manage, document, and communicate effectively.
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