Multimedia Reporting (Bradford)

300 Kansas University students and staff will be volunteering their time and knowledge at the National Association of Student Councils Conference when it comes to campus on June 26 for Knowledge Day.
The NASC conference is held at different high schools around the nation each year.
This year the host that was chosen was Blue Valley Northwest in Overland Park and the theme this year is Follow the Leadership Road.
The conference is offered to high school students who wish to better their leadership skills and help better their high schools.
This year approximately 1300 high school student leaders from all around the nation will be attending the conference from June 23 to June 28.
“The conference allows a gate to open where leadership ideas and concerns can be shared and students can implement better ideas to take home,” said Michele Boeding, the conference coordinator from Blue Valley Northwest High School.
The conference spends most of its five days in Overland Park, but for Knowledge Day the NASC comes to KU for leadership workshops, motivational speakers, a bit of college campus experience, and keynote speakers.
Marlesa Roney, Vice Provost for Student Success, emailed students asking for volunteers to help conference officials with the high school students when they come to the campus for Knowledge Day.
Roney asked that students reach out to their friends and organizations to get involved with Knowledge day.
“It is amazing the commitment we have seen from Dr. Roney and her staff,” said Boeding. “It is greatly appreciated and many students will reap the benefits.”
The student volunteers are needed to assist with greeting the conference members and giving directions around campus.
Student volunteers are also needed to participate in Hawk Trot, which is a three hour long session that allows high school students in small groups to ask college students what college is really like.
“This will be an amazing experience because for many of the students, this will be their first impression of college,” said Boeding. “Seeing a campus through different eyes can be very eye opening.”
The workshops will also be held in classrooms around campus so students can get a real college classroom learning experience.
The use of classrooms for the workshops will not interfere with any of the already scheduled classes for summer courses.
“The NASC conference will not get in the way of our daily routine at KU,” said Roney. “All classes will be held as usual with no changes in location.”
Although the number of students on the KU campus is down because of summer break, the conference is still meeting its need for student volunteers.
The volunteers are able to pick from a number of different times and sessions during the day so they can work their volunteer time into their summer schedules.
“I do not mind volunteering part of my time between classes and work to the conference,” said Adam Hurly, Sioux Falls junior. “It is an exciting opportunity to participate with all of these students coming together to learn more about leadership and to help them get a better understanding of college life.”

Recent city wide budget cuts are causing outside agencies in Lawrence to change their spending habits.

The city commission has recently decided to enforce a 94 percent budget cut throughout the city’s departments and agencies from the general fund.

The cuts were originally proposed to be 96 percent after city officials realized they were not going to make as much revenue as they had originally projected for the fiscal year.

“When we looked at the toll the 96 percent cut would make on the smaller agencies, we decided to look at the budget again,” said Casey Liebst, Lawrence budget manager. “We noticed that smaller agencies and important departments such as Fire and Police Departments were going to be hit too hard, so we reduced the budget to 94 percent and looked to cut some departments such as the city manager’s office more than others.”

Although the city reduced the budget cuts to 94 percent, smaller outside agencies that rely heavily on funding from the city to function are facing financial difficulties.

The 28 outside agencies, like the Lawrence Humane Society and the Boys & Girls Club, will make up 1.5 million dollars of the total budget cuts from the city’s general fund.

“It is hard to make the cuts,” said Liebst. “But we try to make sure that even though the agencies are losing money they need, the cuts will not keep them from operating.”

One of the agencies facing a large monetary loss from their funding because of the 94 percent cut is the Lawrence Humane Society.

The Humane Society has a yearly budget of 750,000 dollars and usually relies on the city of Lawrence to give at least 260,000 dollars of that budget.

With the 94 percent cut the Humane Society will lose 16,000 dollars of money they had expected to get from the city.

“We started renovations on our building that are projected to cost 610,000 dollars,” said Midge Grinstead, director of Lawrence Humane Society. “We have already extended all of our grants for the renovations and the unexpected lost of money will force us to let go two employees, take out loans, and will limit the availability of the services we offer to the community.”

The services the Lawrence Humane Society offer range from basic education to high schools and 4-H clubs to nursing back to health unclaimed injured animals from around the area.

They also take care of all the cruelty and neglect cases that are reported in Lawrence.

“It is upsetting to know we will have to cut back on the services we offer the city,” said Grinstead. “We get money from fundraisers and outside contributors, but nothing will make up for the money we are losing from the city.”

Another outside agency that is facing a significant cut to their budget is Van Go Mobile Art.

Van Go gives at risk teenagers in Douglas County job skills and experience through painting murals and other projects for clients who pay the teenagers money for their work.

“We are looking to lose around 1,400 dollars from the budget cut,” said Sarah Smarsh, a director at Van Go.

Van Go requested the city to give them 35,000 dollars a year, but with the budget cuts the agency will only get about 33,000 dollars.

Although the loss of 1,400 dollars is not as large as the 16,000 dollars the Lawrence Humane Society is losing, Van Go is still worried about where to get funding to replace the money they are losing through the cuts.

“We are not as heavily funded as other outside agencies, but since we are such a small agency it will have a big effect,” said Smarsh. “We will have to look outside the city to get the funding we need.”