Student groups can anticipate increased funding and new policies for the upcoming academic year, the Undergraduate Finance Board announced in a community-wide email last month.
Beginning next year, student groups will be able to request increased conference funding, funds for service groups and funding for food.
Previously, UFB could only pay for two or three members of student groups to attend conferences. Now, groups can request funding for three to five people, according to the email. Student groups will also be able to request funding for 50 percent of food costs for events, according to the email.
In the past, student groups were required to cover costs of any food themselves.
“We really have the chance to do some things that we were never able to do, just because we have a little more to work with,” said Zachary Fischer ’13, UFB chair.
Certain service groups “that have an immediate impact on the Brown campus and within the city” can now request $200 per semester for their service projects, according to the UFB email. More information regarding the specifics of this type of request is “forthcoming,” according to the email.
Fischer said student groups have long appealed to UFB to help with food costs and specifically mentioned the Hellenic Students Association, saying that UFB could help with the costs of a cultural lamb-roast, an event the association has wanted to put on for many years.
Despite the increased budget for next year, Fischer said some needs of student groups will remain unmet.
“I know that hurts a lot of student groups,” he said, adding that UFB would like to have the resources to fully fund all student group activity, but it simply does not have the means to do so.
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