School: Organization Blues

Law school is quite similar to regular college undergrad in a way - the students always seem to want to organize to do things together. Whether it's bringing in speakers, holding events (with food, mostly of the "free" variety), or just shooting the breeze, every day there's some student organization (read: club) that meets.

I used to be like them. I thought my student organization could change the world.

That was before I met "The Machine." Much more threatening than "The Man," the sheer weight of Student Government bureaucracy is almost stupefying in its scope. Here we have a structure with a budget in the millions - every UF student's tuition is raised slightly to pay for this stuff. In almost any private company, even with a budget that big, there are ways to allocate money fast. "I need to set up a company barbecue for this weekend -- No problem, use expense account #XXXXX, Joe'll handle the details tomorrow."

The upshot is that to request money from SG, you need literally a month's advance notice, even if it's just to fund something that's already been funded before. You need to fill out all sorts of forms, both in meatspace and online. All to get at money that supposedly belongs to everybody.

I guess Student Government really is teaching kids about how government works.