Financial Officer: Patrick Wong (asbfinance@gmail.com)
Amount Approved: $24,132
Full Budget

What is the mission and purpose of your student group?

MISSION:

To expose and immerse students to complex social issues through
direct service, experiential learning, group discussion, and
individual reflection, thereby transforming them into advocates
of social change.

PURPOSE:

The purpose of Alternative Spring Break is to allow students to
expose and immerse students to social, economic, political, and
cultural issues through service-learning experiences. 
Service-learning is a theoretical and methodological framework
which emphasizes the interplay and feedback between direct
service to related communities and learning about the issue
through directed reading, discussion, and reflection.

FURTHER INFORMATION:

Visit our website, http://asb.stanford.edu

Why are you requesting Special Fees?

Alternative Spring Break is requesting Special Fees because the
group requires funding that lies outside of both the amounts and
policies for funds granted under General Fees.  ASB runs fourteen
spring break service-learning experiences each year, making it
one of the largest community service organizations on campus. 
During spring break, ASB covers almost all expenses, including
housing, food, local transportation, and honoraria and program
fees.  While ASB charges a participant fee (see below for further
explanation), the fee only covers part of the full cost for a
participant.  The program relies on the support of Special Fees
and other funding sources for sustainability.  Furthermore, ASB
provides a generous financial aid program, which Special Fees
support.  While ASB encourages all trip leaders and participants
to lead simply during the one week, Special Fees provides a large
proportion of our budget in order to keep the group financially
sustainable.

As a community service organization in which participants travel
to various locations to perform service and learn about social
issues, there are various costs that are not typically awarded
through General Fees.  These include housing costs, which are
typically paid as honoraria to churches, schools, or local Boys
and Girls Clubs.  Also, car and van rentals are necessary for
easy transport within a local area.

IMPACT:

ASB delivers substantial value to the Stanford community.  We are
a nationally renowned Alternative Break program, and coordinators
regularly field questions from other campuses seeking to initiate
or improve their own programs.  This year, ASB has spoken to a
representative from Carnegie Mellon University.  We have been
quoted in newspapers such as the San Francisco Chronicle, and
were featured in The Stanford Fund newsletter, which seeks to
raise funds available to all student groups on campus as well as
other academic initiatives and financial aid.  On-campus, ASB is
a resource for other groups seeking to create similar programs. 
In the 2003-04 year, ASB offered advice and knowledge to a group
of graduate students in Earth Systems and to SCOPE, both of which
were looking to create their own Alternative Break experiences. 
ASB has directly inspired the creation of other campus groups,
including AIYME and Street Forum.

What are the three largest line item requests in your budget and why?

1. Car/Van Rentals:  Where possible, local public transportation
is used as much as possible.  For example, this year's trip to
Washington, D.C. will take advantage of the area's excellent
public transportation network and not use van rentals.  However,
where local public transportation is lacking or insufficient,
vans are critical for quickly and efficiently transporting a
group of fourteen students.  As each group requiring vans
requires two rentals, these costs quickly add up, causing car/van
rentals to be the largest line item request for the group's
Special Fees budget.

2. Meeting Food: In addition to a Fall Quarter trip leader
welcome dinner and a Winter Quarter trip leader send-off dinner,
we have nearly 200 mouths to feed for a week during Spring Break.
 With our current line item request for food, Special Fees pays
for about $5.00/day during the spring break week.

3. Accommodations:  Being close to the physical location of the
populations that the trip is serving is key to the success of the
program.  However, accommodations in many urban trip
destinations, such as the San Francisco Bay Area, Washington,
D.C., and Hawaii, can be expensive.  While groups are encouraged
to seek low-cost affordable housing at churches or local
organizations, such groups often require a small honorarium. 
With our budgeted amount, each group has $200 to provide
week-long housing for fourteen students.

If you applied for Special Fees last year, is there an increase in the
amount you're seeking this year?  If so, why?

There is an increase of 9% in the amount we are seeking this
year.  We hope that this increase will allow us to expand our
program from fourteen to fifteen trips next year.  ASB saw a
record number of applicants for this year's program, an
indication of the huge demand for our program.  Trip leaders
turned away many qualified applicants.  By increasing the number
of trips, and hence participant spaces, we hope to serve a
greater proportion of the Stanford community.

More specifically, we have increased amounts for van rentals,
accomodations, meeting food, and honoraria to accomodate for
extra trips.  To reduce costs, we have decreased the amount
allocated for educational literature, as many student-initiated
courses have opted to distribute copies of the weekly readings
electronically via Coursework.  As this trend that is likely to
continue, photocopying expenses for educational literature is
likely to decrease.