All Annual Grants must contain only predictable expenses. This ensures that the costs that the student body will shoulder are tangible and clearly defined. As you draft your budget, please include any necessary documentation to help contextualize your line items (e.g. vendor invoices for services expected). You may also use ASSU-set per-person allocations to help estimate the cost of your event (e.g. if the ASSU covers dinner at $8 per person and you are expecting 50 people for a dinner event, your food cost estimate would be $400 without need for documentation).
Please note that other factors may lead to recommended or required budget adjustments. In order to maintain the stability of the Student Activities Fee, we ask that VSO budgets do not increase by more than 7% for undergraduate groups and currently 5% for graduate groups over a given year unless there is an exhibited change in operations that warrants the increase, other factors may lead to recommended or required budget adjustments, even with reasoning for a budget increase in excess of % increase cap.
All expenses in your request must be predictable. This requirement can be fulfilled by providing either:
Your VSO must be recognized, have no outstanding debts, and not on a OSE-mandated probation.
Your probation end date should be listed in the contract letter that VSO founders receive after completing the new student organization application process with the Office of Student Engagement.
If a significant number of members or beneficiaries of your VSO’s activities are both graduate and undergraduate students, the ASSU may split funding between the Undergrad and Graduate student bodies. If you are unsure if your VSO is classified as a joint-group, please reach out.
There are several groups that fall under the two umbrella groups (Club Sports and Asian American Students’ Association), who are responsible for applying and distributing annual grant funds to it’s sub-groups. If you are an FO of a sub-group, you will not submit your own annual grant application, instead work with the umbrella group FO to plan out your budget.
If you are the FO of an Umbrella Group, you must detail the expenses of your constituent groups in your application as well. To ease this burden, you should involve your constituent FO’s in the budgeting process as much as you are able.
Annual Grants should not be expected to cover your VSO’s entire budget. FO’s should make efforts to obtain funding from alternative sources such as TSF, academic departments, Stanford Arts, etc. Please note that groups that receive Annual Grants are not eligible to receive Standard and Quick Grant applications for that same academic year.
APPLICATION TIMELINE | ||
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Week 2 | Monday, January 16th | Application Opens at 1:00 AM |
Week 4 | Friday, February 3rd | Application Closes at 11:59 PM |
Week 5 | February 4th - 10th | Review Period (VSOs will be notified of recommendations by February 10th) |
Week 5 & 6 | February 11th - 17th | Revision Period |
Week 6 | February 13th - 17th | Initial Recommendations sent to Undergraduate Senate & Graduate Student Council |
Week 7 | February 20th - 24th | Governing Bodies vote on Final Recommendations |
Week 9 | March 5th - March 10th (tentative dates) | Petition Declaration Period |
Spring - Week 2 | April 13th & 14th | Spring Elections |
If a VSO goes through the Usual Process and is not content with their recommended allocation, they may still obtain ballot access. These are the steps:
***NOTE: All Annual Grants are subject to the predictability requirements laid out by the ASSU Constitution. As such, no VSO may petition for an expense not documented as outlined in the Usual Process.
If a group successfully petitions, their annual grant request will be placed on the ASSU General Election Ballot – alongside a statement from the relevant legislative body on why that body did not recommend your group’s original budget request.
If your group unsuccessfully petitions, you will no longer be eligible for an annual grant this year. However, you will still have access to ASSU standard, quick grants, and other University funding sources, such as The Stanford Fund Partnership Program (TSF).
Zoom Link For ASSU Office Hours.
Live Calendar of ASSU Office Hours (More Specific Grant Questions, Recommendations, etc.)
Live Calendar of SSE Office Hours (GrantEd Support, General Funding Questions)