Montclair State University’s Center for Student Involvement introduced the Co-Sponsorship Program earlier this month, with the mission of helping student organizations.
Casey Coleman, the assistant director of student involvement, explained the purpose of the program.
“The program entails support to clubs or organizations who might need it,” Coleman said. “[Student organizations] can learn how to program, plan, budget, communicate and enhance their leadership skills from this program. We recognize that students have a lot of questions when it comes to program planning and we want to offer our expertise to help these students learn while also being successful.”
Coleman mentioned how the center’s support process used to work based off of requests but the new program will help to organize that through time and planning.
“This program is aiming to streamline our process,” Coleman said. “We used to field random requests and now we’re hoping by doing this everyone will be more organized and groups will have more time and support when it comes to planning.”
The program is fit to benefit student organizations through taking the stress off of programming and other struggles that may come their way.
“The goal is to take the edge off of programming,” Coleman said. “We offer hundreds of programs a year and we’re hoping by collaborating we can teach [student organizations] the tools to be successful. There is financial support, staff support and volunteer opportunities available.”
Greek Life graduate coordinator, William Dominguez, explained how the program brings student organizations together.
William Dominquez is a grad student studying social work and a coordinator for Greek life.
Dani Mazariegos | The Montclarion
“It’s the centerpiece,” Dominguez said. “It’s the bridge that now bridges all different [organizations] together to be able to receive credit for partnering with different [organizations]. The theme is belonging. So [the Center for Student Involvement is] really working on that.”
Dominguez also shared how the program can uplift student organizations, as struggles had brought some down in the past.
“Ultimately [the program is] beneficial,” Dominguez said. “We’re seeing that with the current population of students, a lot of the transitional work when it comes to passing down and educating their members on how to do things, how to remain interactive and involved within [organizations], began to simmer down or has been simmered down the last couple of years. So now the fact that [the Center for Student Involvement] is opening that door to teach individuals the ropes when it comes to programming, booking events, financial assistance stuff like that, it reignites the desire for individuals to want to do these things for the [organizations] again.”
Saniya Meyers, Center for Student Involvement graduate coordinator, hopes the program will allow for more organization regarding events.
“We hope this program will create a more organized community of events and allow our students to use resources from one another to put on unforgettable events,” Meyers said.
Meyers also shared that there have yet to be any problems regarding the program, keeping hopes for its success.
“We have not had any struggles so far,” Meyers said.
Coleman said there are many ways to contact the Center for Student Involvement.
“Any organizations interested should either email [the Center for Student Involvement], stop by our office or even [direct message] us on Instagram,” Coleman said.
