Allocating a budget lesser than last semester’s over a million, the SAMAHAN Central Board (SCB) adjusted the first-semester budgeting accordingly, still granting clusters the largest portion.

With a total of 7425 enrollees from different clusters, the entire SAMAHAN budget was PHP 742,500 from the PHP 100 SAMAHAN fee. 

Since the balance forwarded from the previous term during the second semester was only PHP 166,065, the budget for the first semester totaled PHP 908,565, almost PHP 200,000 less than last semester’s PHP 1,165,143. 

Similar to the previous semester, the SCB allocated most of the PHP 908,000 budget for the clusters and its upcoming events, which can be viewed here. 

The clusters took the most of the general budget in the first semester with PHP 322,723, events came in second with 285,000, and then office & departments with  PHP 270,842. 

Each cluster garnered different amounts of budgets—in correspondence to their number of enrollees, with the majority voting for the base budget of PHP 18,000.

SAMAHAN cluster officers had a voting system with the choices of PHP 10,000, PHP 15,000, and PHP 18,000. It was a majority vote for the PHP 18,000 budget, with eight clusters voting for PHP 18,000 and five clusters voting for 15,000. 

The School of Engineering and Architecture, Business and Management, and Accountancy had the most number of enrollees with a percentage of 25,09%, 20.98%, and 15.08%, respectively.

SAMAHAN offices and organizations’ final budget

The Office of the Vice President proposed a budget of PHP 63,500 for Disaster Risk and Reduction Management, yet COA only approved PHP 25,000, one-third of its ideal budget. 

Amassing almost half of their proposed budget, the Office of the Secretary-General also submitted a budget of PHP 55,165 for Ateneo SAMAHAN Productions, but only PHP 25,700 was pushed through.

The Council of Class Presidents was allotted PHP 30,000 in budget, but it will only be allocated to them during their elections. 

The annual intramurals, Fiesta, which will be held next week on August 11-13, had an additional budget of PHP 70,000 to ensure its grand opening and preparations, considering its blended set-up. 

The SAMAHAN officers voted on the final budget draft, and the Commission on Audit ratified and approved the budget through a memorandum, where each department was given a chance to present their budget proposals for the upcoming first semester. 

The SCB held its first semester budget hearing via Zoom on August 5, 2022, at 3 PM, and will conduct its budget hearing again at the beginning of the second semester of the academic year 2022 – 2023.