------------------------------------ How to Run the FSA 1.0 (a short FAQ) ------------------------------------ Hello! I thought I'd write this reference on how to run a group like the FSA, just in case everyone with this knowledge leaves. The Activities Students Association (ASA) is really awful at indoctrinating new groups on how to do things - everything is assumed to be passed on by osmosis or something. This document is a quick guide of how to do things. Table of contents: I. Why join the ASA ..... What requirements are there to be recognized as an ASA group? ..... What goes in the group Constitution? II. Managing the email lists ..... What are the mailing lists, and how do I edit them? ..... What is the officers list? ..... What is a financial signature? a non-financial signature? III. Funding ..... How do we get funding? ..... What is the funding schedule? ..... What goes in a budget proposal? In a budget defense? ..... How do reimbursements work? ..... How can we check how much money we've spent this term? IV. Running an event ..... How do we reserve a room for an event? This FAQ was last updated 5/21/01. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx --------------------------------------- I. Why join the ASA? Really, the only reason to join the ASA is so you can get MIT to fund your activities. A group of people can get together and do social things and celebrate cultural unity on their own, but it's nice when MIT helps sponsor events and items. To be a member of the ASA, a group must have a President and a Treasurer - they can't be the same person. At least half of the group must be MIT students, and the group must contain at least 5 MIT students. Anyone can be a member of an ASA group - MIT undergrads, grads, faculty, staff, students from other universities, people on the street, etc. Groups are supposed to have a Constitution which describes all offices in the group and their responsibilities, but almost all groups just write one at their inception, making up new offices and delete old ones, and then never update the Constitution. The MITFSA is one of those groups :) Our constitution is at http://web.mit.edu/mitfsa/www/FSAconstitution.html There are a few meetings a year (maybe one a term) when the UA (Undergraduate Association) requires a representative of your group to show up. Failing to send a representative can mean de-recongnition of the group! There's usually important information about upcoming UA changes (e.g. UA elections, policy changes), but mostly it's irrelevant stuff. Many groups send a representative to get their group attendance checked off who then leave in the middle. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ------------------------------------------- II. Managing the email lists, officer lists Every ASA group has at least one MIT mailing list. The FSA has two email lists: filipinos@MIT.EDU and mitfsa@MIT.EDU. filipinos@MIT is the general mailing lists - announcements for the whole Filipino community. Representatives of other schools, head contacts are on this list. mitfsa@MIT is the admin mailing list. It "owns" the filipinos mailing list. Theoretically, before posting on the filipinos@MIT mailing list people are supposed to write mitfsa@MIT and then get permission to post to filipinos@MIT - the idea is mitfsa@MIT filters out SPAM and such. (That's why the link on the web site is to mitfsa, and not filipinos.) But really, it's no big deal. ********* To see the members of a mailing list, (we'll use filipinos here as an example, just substitute mitfsa if you like) athena% blanche filipinos |more ********* To add a member to a mailing list, (say, someone whose email is janedoe) athena% blanche filipinos -a janedoe ********* Or to add someone not from MIT (say, email is janedoe@hotmail.com) athena% blanche filipinos -a janedoe@hotmail.com ********* To remove a member from a mailing list, athena% blanche filipinos -d janedoe@hotmail.com Note that only members from the mitfsa@MIT mailing list can add or remove members from the mitfsa@MIT mailing list using blanche. (They've got different permissions - you'd have to see SIPB or something if you want to change how the mailing list works. Don't, though :) Generally when people leave MIT they forget to remove themselves from mailing lists, so their emails bounces around everywhere when their email addresses becomes invalid. Do others a favor and remove them from the mailing list :) ********************* The officers list is something different from the mailing lists - it's the ASA's official list of whom your officers are. To edit the officers list, athena% setup asa Then select "1" to update the group's information... we're "Filipino Students Association". The following menus are self-explanatory. There are two types of signatures - Financial Signatures and Non-Financial Signatures. A financial signature is required for a person to be reimbursed for expenditures; that is, if person X buys something, then it cannot be reimbursed unless a person Y with a financial signature signs a reimbursement form. (More on this in the reimbursement section, under funding.) A non-financial signature is required to reserve rooms for the group - either in the student center or on campus. Note that when you run setup asa, there's no place for like the Secretary or VP or anything - that's because they're not required offices for ASA membership. But groups usually need such offices, so responsiblities can be delegated. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ------------------------------------- III. How to get funding ASA funding is really complicated at first, but it can be made simple once you get the hang of it and get organized. Some time near the beginning of each term, there is a Treasurer Training session that the Treasurer is supposed to attend. At the meeting, the treasurer learns everything on how to get refunds, request for money, appeal for money, etc. But for convenience sake it's presented again below. Each ASA group must submit a budget proposal and budget defense for things they want funding. These proposals can be picked up at the W20-401 UA Office or printed off the http://web.mit.edu/finboard/www/ Finboard web site. Budget proposals are submitted one term IN ADVANCE of the term for which the group receives funding. So for example, to receive funding for Spring 2002, the group must submit the proposal during Fall 2001. The treasurer receives an email reminder that the budget proposal must be submitted. It is possible to appeal for more funding. Budget appeals are held at the beginning of the term that the group is requesting funding. But appealing requires standing up in front of the UA and giving an oral defense of why you want the money, for all the expenditures on the budget request - it's possible to get the money this way, but much more of a hassle. They're generally less generous at this stage. We have a sample budget proposal and defense in the /mit/mitfsa/Budget locker; feel free to copy it. To fill out the budget form: 1. Think of everything the group wants to spend money on next term. 2. Divide the expenses into publicity, operations, capital, events: Publicity includes posters, flyers, markers, staplers to put the flyers up, etc. Costs that go to drawing people to the group or events count as publicity. Operations are the costs of running the group - usually little; generally we just have the FIND costs. But if we were to do a lot of dances, so many that we need a dance instructor or there'd be no FSA, say, then hiring a dance instructor and expenses to cover transporation for the dance lessons would go under operations. Capital are things the FSA would own, and pass on to future FSAs, like CD's, bamboo sticks, dance costumes, cooking pots and pans, combination locks. Events are one-time expenditures for events. Transportation to Ben and Jerry's, food bought for study breaks, costs to hire the band, all go under events. 3. Put "Y" next to "Finboard Funded?" in each column, to signify we want Finboard to fund everything. (An "N" would mean we plan to pay for the expenditure ourselves... which doesn't make sense since we're getting Finboard to pay for it. :) 4. Usually we have no assets left over from previous terms. Our current group number is 2720123, but that might change every year - you can ask for the group number at the RLSLP office (5th floor student center). We had 40 undergrads, 25 grad members in 2001 - don't worry too much about the exact number, people just want a ballpark estimate. Counting the number of names on the mailing list and then fingering them to find out grad/undergrad status is fine. The budget defense is a one page, and includes a description of everything listed in your budget proposal. It's ok to just copy the old budget proposal and change the "Spring 2001" to the current semester - that's what we did. Some final advice on the budget request: list everything that you might want funding for on your proposal, even if you don't think you'll hold the event. It's really really hard to get funding later if the group changes its mind. Also, over-estimate the cost of everything - the UA is really rich and slobby and has pizza at every meeting, so you can be just as extravagant at your events. It's amazing what the UA will fund, you'll be surprised. (We once got $50 for "cultural decorations"... we had no idea what cultural decorations even were :) The complicated form is just to scare people. The treasurer will receive an email with their allocations a few weeks after the budget requests are due. It looks like: > > Category Amount > -------- ------- > Operations: $75.00 > Capital: $200.00 > Events: $700.00 > Publicity and Printing: $100.00 > > Total " $1,075.00 " What this means is that the group can spend up to $75 of what the group requested under operations, up to $200 of what the group requested under capital, etc. The budget caps within the proposal still apply - if you asked for $500 study breaks under the events category, and got $700 for events, you're still limited to $500 for study breaks. Money does not get carried over from term to term. If a group doesn't use its money, it goes back to the UA... so go big on those events :) To get reimbursed - 1. Save the receipt from the expenditure. Circle the expenditure on the receipt. 2. Go to the RLSLP office on the 5th floor of the student center. 3. Obtain out a Finance Board Expense Voucher - they're in a rack on the small table directly in front of the entrance. There are two types of vouchers... make sure yours says Finance Board on it. 4. Fill out the form and submit: Group Name: Filipino Students Associaton FinBoard Account #: 2720123 (or whatever the new number is) FinBoard Liasion: (whoever the liaison for the FSA is - you can ask the deskperson at the RLSLP office if you don't know) Check Payable to: (whoever bought the item) Item Description: (item as it appears on the budget request - e.g. Christmas Potluck) Receipt Date: (if you have it ) Amount: (amount on the receipt) Category: (capital, publicity, events, or operations - as it appears on the proposal) Check One: (however the check should be picked up the check) Authorized Officer: (your name) Signature: (FSA financial signature) Date submitted: (date) Note that someone with a financial signature is needed to authorize the expenditure. To change who has financial signatures, see the section above on "setup asa", under section 2, changing the officers list. At the time of writing this document, the UA has a really awful and non-intuitive way of checking how much funding has been used up, using SQL's database program "warehouse": athena% add rlslp athena% warehouse You'll be asked for a password - I think whoever logs in sets it. But in case I'm wrong, I registered the password "ds63mant"... it's worth a shot. Then at the SQL prompt SQL> @detail When requested for Cost Object Number, enter 2720123, the group's finboard number. That should print a list of expenses. SQL> @fbalances prints the term's Finboard funding, and how much has been sent in refunds. Just one last word on funding - Finboard does save some money for those groups that miss the deadline and budget appeals. If you're really late on things and don't mind being scrutinized, you can ask about it at the Finboard office or the RLSLP office. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx -------------------------------------- IV. How to reserve a room The person reserving a room needs a non-financial signature (see "setup asa" at the end of section 2, configuring officer lists). To reserve a room in the student center, inquire at the 5th floor of the student center at the Campus Activities Office (near the elevators). They'll make you fill out a form; you'll need to know the date, time, how many people will show up, whether you want a TV/VCR. If there'll be food at the event, you'll need an additional form from the MIT catering office next door (even if you don't want MIT catered food!). To reserve a room on campus, see the scheduling office - is it 7-121? It's in the first office on the left as you enter lobby 7 from the steps. They'll make you provide similar information as above. It's good to reserve a room as early as possible, but room reservations must be cancelled 2 days in advance if you end up not wanting them. There's a fine if you don't use your room - which totally sucks. They supposedly check, too. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx --------------------------------------- That concludes this FAQ. Maybe the only thing left is the door combination to the Small Activities Office - I forgot it - but it's available at the UA Office (W20-401) upon request. Best wishes to all future FSAs! John Viloria FSA Treasurer 2000-2001