[22983] in APO-L
[APO-L] Proposal Question: B-02-035 & B-02-036: Raise Initiate Fee &
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Derek J. Cashman)
Mon Oct 21 16:21:55 2002
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 16:20:59 -0400
Reply-To: "Derek J. Cashman" <derek.cashman@VCU.EDU>
From: "Derek J. Cashman" <derek.cashman@VCU.EDU>
To: APO-L@LISTSERV.IUPUI.EDU
Ok, I guess I'll start off the debate here! We actually just had a
National Convention Planning Conference (NCPC) at James Madison
University this past weekend, and a few questions were raised about
these particular pieces of legislation. The Reference Numbers are in the
subject, and these two proposals were submitted as part of a "package"
by Jack MacKenzie, John Wetherington, & Bobby Hainline. They propose to
raise the National Active Initiate Fee (currently $25) to $75 (keep in
mind the idea of SCOPE) as well as to eliminate the AAMD fee (currently
$15 per year per active member). The rationale for doing this is to,
"Increase fees to support the operations and programs of this
fraternity."
The questions raised by several of the students there (myself included)
was exactly what "operations and programs" would benefit by this? In
other words, where is the extra money going?
Clearly, the Fraternity stands to make extra money off of this. Let's do
some simple math. Currently, we're taking in $15 per year from active
brothers (who are active an average of 2 years, so that's $30 total),
plus $25 for every new initiate, as well as the $10 pledge fee (which is
not changed by these resolutions). So we take in approximately $65 for
every brother initiated into the Fraternity. Under the new proposal,
we'd lose the $15 AAMD Fee, keep the Pledge Fee, and raise the active
initiate fee to $75; so this is a NET GAIN of $20 per active member.
From the National Fraternity's viewpoint, it looks like a good idea; get
all the fees from individuals right away, up front, so you don't have to
worry about them going inactive later on down the road and losing more
money. So we'll be making more money. However, from the chapter's
viewpoint, this may not be such a good idea, since one of the biggest
selling points of APO is the low dues we have to pay (particularly
compared to other greek organizations). Using Alpha Delta Iota (VCU) as
an example, the current dues are $10 (NPF) + $25 (NAI) + $15 (chapter
fee to support cost of pledgebooks & materials) = $50. If the NAI is
increase to $75, that means that ADI's fees total $100 for the cost of
pledging; yup - simple math says that ADI's pledging fees just DOUBLED!
Currently, ADI's payment structure is $25 at induction (pledge) and $25
at initiation (brother), since making them pay all $50 at once was
generally too much to ask for (most pledges opted for a payment plan
instead). One wonders how many pledges ADI will be able to recruit and
retain if fees are doubled. [ of course, this is just one chapter's
example; other chapters may vary on this. ]
Of course, the option also remains to reduce the proposal from
increasing fees to $75, to increasing fees by any amount between $25 &
$75. However, if we eliminate the AAMD, we can't reduce the proposal by
more than $20 or we may lose money. Although, I believe it would still
be in scope to decrease the AAMD fee from $15 to anywhere between $0 and
$15 (correct me if I'm wrong).
So the bottom line is, since we're going to be making more money off of
this, how is the extra money going to be used?
_____
Derek J. Cashman (derek.cashman@vcu.edu)
Treasurer & Voting Delegate; Alpha Delta Iota Chapter; Alpha Phi Omega
Graduate Student, Department of Medicinal Chemistry
MCV Campus of Virginia Commonwealth University
_____
"A Drug is any substance which, when injected into a rat, produces a
publishable, scientific paper."
