After a lengthy deliberation on whether or not to fund the Association of Malaysian Students at ISU for its Malaysian Cultural Night this spring, the Senate decided to send the $4,200 request back to the finance committee for further review.

Some of the biggest concerns voiced by the Senate, specifically Vice Speaker Cody Woodruff, was the lack of student organization funding being listed on the bill, as well as the Senate’s unwillingness to further debate the merits of a request.

As per an amendment to the funding request, Student Government was originally listed to put forth $3,200 toward food for the event in an attempt to make it free.

Woodruff was concerned, however, because in recent years Senate funded the event at half the rate of this year.

Additionally, the student organization had already been allocated roughly $2,000 in funding for the event.

Ultimately, the Senate motioned to move the funding request back to the finance committee, emphasizing that the committee should look into putting the request through priorities and criteria which would limit the funding the event would be allowed.

Other funding requests, however, were approved by the Senate including a $3,300 request from Students Today Leaders Forever to attend a conference in Texas as well as a $3,000 request from C-Nettes for uniforms.

The Senate also funded $750 to the Club Managers Association of America for travel expenses for a conference in California.

Lastly, the Senate approved a necessary internal funding request of $6,000 to be transferred from Student Government’s special projects account to the election commission to support the public funding option for the upcoming election cycle. 

Several appointments were also approved by the Senate including former election commissioner Bradlee Fair to serve on the election commission as a general member, Sen. Kelsey Culbertson to rules committee and Jack Meyers to senator of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.