» Selena Farnesi

Associated Students, Inc. is the recognized student government at Fresno State.  Each semester, students pay several fees, one of which is the Student Body Fee of $34.50. For the 2012-2013 academic year, ASI is projecting to have a total budget of $624,490.00.

Paying for College is getting more and more expensive for students.  With tuition and fee increases, the cost of textbooks and other class materials, campuses have to find ways to keep college affordable while still providing a quality education.

In Monday’s issue, students received the first installment of a three-part series on budgets and fees. This series is a collaborative effort between ASI and The Collegian. It is our hope that this series will help students become more informed about the budgets and fees that affect their student experiences.

As more and more of the costs of higher education are shifted to students, and news of continued budget cuts plague public higher education institutions, many students have started to ask how we got into this mess in the first place.  Many of the budgetary decisions that impact higher education in California were made more than a decade ago and still impact our institutions’ funding today.

Associated Students, Inc. elections are right around the corner.  Elections will be held online, Tuesday, March 27 through Thursday, March 29. With just a week before ballots end up in your Fresno State email, campaign Facebook pages have been made, posters are tacked up in the halls and candidates can be found passing out business cards in the Free Speech Area.

It’s election season at Fresno State — time to start thinking about if you or someone you know would make a great president, vice president or senator to Fresno State’s student government.

In any sort of election, be it for student government positions, City Council or Congress, a lot of attention is focused on the political party of the candidate.  Are they Republican or Democrat? Are they radical or moderate? A lot of the concern regarding an individual’s political party is focused on fiscal issues.

As students are welcomed back to school this week, they are bombarded with several realities: classes have filled up, more students have enrolled, old budget cuts are permanent, new budget cuts are looming and job markets for new graduates are still saturated.

From Facebook pages to meetings, students and faculty are sharing their opinion on parts of the budget proposal.