After the creation of the Office of Student Leadership Involvement, Formation and Empowerment (SLIFE) in the year 2006 to replace the Office of Student Activities (OSAc) and Student Development Office (SDO), the Student Activities Manual also replaced the OSAc Manual. The Student Activities Manual contains guidelines and regulations by which all student organizations under SLIFE should follow in relation to the policies in the University.
Accreditation and evaluation of student organizations, due processes and regulations on student activities, and standards by which all student organizations are to follow are some of the minutes that can be found in Student Activities Manual.
This Academic Year 2013-2014, as scheduled, the necessary revisions that the Student Activities Manual has gone through will be effective by the third term. The circulation of the Student Activities Manual is said to start at the end of the second term.
The process of revision
The preparation of revision, such as consulting with student organizations among others, usually begins at a term prior to the year of revision while the final revision as well as the implementation takes place on the year itself.
Involved in the revision of the Student Activities Manual are SLIFE Coordinator of Student Operations, University Student Government (USG) Vice President (VP) for Internal Affairs, Department of Activity and Approval Monitoring (DAAM) chairperson under USG VP-Internals, Council of Student Organization (CSO) chairperson, CSO Secretary and President of Student Organizations.
In light of student organizations
Jessica Morales, the SLIFE Coordinator for Operations of Student Organizations, shared the main concern of the students regarding the Student Activities Manual. She says, “The main concerns were the allowable number of Fund Raising Activities (FRA) per year, the limited options of products to be sold in Selling Activities, and the due process of getting the approval of activities.” Currently, student organizations are allowed to have four FRAs per academic year.
Any act of selling is not allowed by student organizations which is in line with DLSU’s non-commercialization policy. However, student organizations are allowed to sell academic related items such as goggles and lab gowns and novelty items which must bear the mark or logo of the student organization. Though all the concerns cannot be addressed, the revision is said to have taken due consideration of the student organizations.
2013-2016 Student Activities Manual
In the last version of the Student Activities Manual, the Student Affairs (SA) office was still referred to as Student Personnel Services (SPS). In line with the change from SPS to SA, the revised version of the Student Activities Manual includes revision in the office’s vision-mission.
Apart from addressing students concerns, the manual also includes revisions on the part of University partners of Organizations, part of which includes a slight change in faculty advisers’ roles in an organization, calling for their more participation in an organization through attendance in meetings, submission of evaluation forms and presence in activities both on and off campus.
Another major revision in the manual is the organizational standards for USG and CSO organizations, while maintaining the 60-40 division of CSO organization activities into career-related and/or co-curricular, and other activities, respectively. In addition, a new section in the manual discusses the nature of activities for organizations to take into consideration during the planning stage as well as for evaluation and re-accreditation.
Concerns raised by the Associate Vice President Campus Services were also addressed in the revision of the manual, by creating provisions that would avoid students from selling existing services in the University during Selling Activities.
Some other minor revisions in the manual include an updated list of venues as Henry Sy Sr. Hall was established, and as DLSU merged with Canlubang Campus to form DLSU-STC. Minor rewording of terminologies, as well as addition of provisions and required forms have taken place in the revised Student Activities Manual.
OSAc Manual until 2010-2013
In the previous years, with the creation of SLIFE and abolition of OSAc and SDO, the Student Activities Manual was supposedly to replace OSAc Manual to follow the new change of office. However, it failed to meet its released date (first term) and was delayed even though the office was already created, causing minor conflict among Student Council (SC), CSO Chairperson, and SLIFE Director. However, the Student Activities Manual was released within the year 2007.
The revision of first Student Activities Manual happened three years later, and the major changes were mainly on the names of the relevant people and on the changes in system and creation of new offices, rendering more shared allocation of works. The task of handling matters concerning international students inside the University were transferred to International Center (IC) after its creation in the year 2009, and the significant transition from SC to USG brought out operational changes in the Manual as well.
