Student Technology Fee
On February 25, 2002, through a CUNY Board of Trustees resolution, the Student Technology Fee Fund was established. Every semester each full-time student pays a $100 technology fee, and each part-time student pays a $50 technology fee, which replenishes the annual Fund. In essence, students finance approximately $2,000,000, or the majority of the College's technology budget. In this light, each year, technology fee committee student members give voice to the fund distribution decision-making process. Keep in mind that a significant portion of the Tech Fee budget is consumed by the library's annual digital subscriptions fees, and other recurring Tech Fee Fund costs, so in actuality, only a portion, maybe 20% of incoming Tech Fee Funds, are available for new distribution.
The annual Tech Fee Fund distribution is initiated by a Student Technology Fee Proposal Call. During the Fall semester, departments should draft technology fee proposals, allowing time to evaluate needs, plan project details, and to determine priorities. Keep in mind that information technology requests may include:hardware, software, and IT associated labor only. Hardware includes printers, computers and computing devices, monitors, external/internal hard drives, cables, digital cameras, network jack/access point installations, parts, security alarms for computer labs and other specialized technical equipment. Software includes apps and programs necessary to perform specific computer functions or tasks. An example of IT associated labor is a Tech Team computer lab student technician.Tech fee proposals must exclude all non-technology related items.
By February of the Spring semester, each department may submit to the Dean one or more (prioritized if more than one) technology fee proposals. All proposals must demonstrate a direct benefit to students that will lead to effective, improved student learning, and/or they must demonstrate pedagogically sound faculty development that will improve instruction, teaching methods, etc. The proposals must be complete, legible, and demonstrate cost effectiveness. Those that include matching or supporting funding sources, and those that support new initiatives are looked upon favorably.
The Dean prioritizes all submitted proposals. All Deans submit their prioritized Tech Fee proposal lists to the Provost. The Provost prioritizes and submits to the Technology Fee Committee Chair all academic Tech Fee proposals. During the following two months, the Student Technology Fee Committee, consisting of Vice President of Information Technology, all college Vice Presidents or their representatives, the Schools Deans or Associate Deans, the Chief Librarian, two faculty members, and two students convenes a number of times to review, edit and determine the fee distribution. The committee recommended proposals are sent to the President for review. In March the President forwards approved proposal recommendations to CUNY Central.
During the next fall semester, following CUNY Central approval, actual funds become available. Then IT creates and processes purchase requisitions. Each purchase requisition requires three subsequent levels of approval before it is forwarded to the Purchasing Department. The Purchasing Department in turn assigns a purchasing agent who creates the Purchase Orders, which are then submitted to the vendors, and in the e-procurement system, a Receiving Report is created. As Technology Fee Fund purchased items are received, end users confirm their receipt, which completes the Receiving Reports. Subsequently, the Accounts Payable Department pays the vendors, and the Technology Fee Funding cycle is now complete.
A main goal of the School of Arts and Humanities is to foster transparency of student technology fee funded projects. This commitment is reinforced in the Lehman College ITR mission statement that states "We deliver by being accountable…for the transparent management of computing, data …” Through reconciliation reports, we are able to track technology fee items from proposal, approval, purchasing, and implementation. This procedure ultimately ensures our student-generated financial resources are indeed fully benefiting our students.
