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Smofcon Scholarships

  1. Arisia shall allocate $1,000 for Smofcon Scholarships each year. This amount should be included in future Corporate Budgets.
  2. People interested in applying for a Scholarship should apply to the Eboard (preferably by email after the September Corporate Meeting and elections).
  3. People should apply with a brief description of how their attending Smofcon will benefit fandom (including Arisia) and/or themselves, an estimated budget to attend, a requested amount of funding, and a minimum required amount of funding.
  4. The intent of this Scholarship is to help people attend, but not pay the entire cost.
    [For example and these are totally random made up numbers: Sandy Fan applies and gives a reason for attending. They say it is going to cost $350 for airfare, $300 for hotel (as they would like to be there Friday for the detailed program on X and stay through the end of day on Sunday and will share a room with one other person), and $100 for food (since breakfast and lunch are usually provided at Smofcon) for a total of $750. They are requesting a $500 scholarship but would accept anything above $250.]
  5. The Eboard should decide how to allocate the Scholarships by November 1st based upon all applications it has received by the end of the day scheduled for the October Corporate Meeting (or the end of day of the third Sunday in October if there is no October meeting scheduled). The Eboard may choose to grant less money than requested or to not grant any money at all to the applicants.
  6. While these Scholarships are open to all, if more eligible people apply than can be funded at their requested levels, preference should be given to members of the Arisia Community whose attendance at Smofcon would benefit Arisia.
    [For example: If two eligible people from within the Arisia community apply and ask for between $250 and $500 each, preference should be given to them.]
  7. If after (f) above is taken into account, more eligible applicants remain than can be funded at their minimum required levels, preference should be given to the best cases presented so that they can be funded at their minimum required levels.
    [For example: If four eligible people from within the Arisia community apply and ask for between $250 and $500 each, they should each be given $250. If five eligible people from with the Arisia community apply and ask for between $250 and $500 each, the Eboard should pick the best four cases. Etc.]
  8. Members of the Eboard (voting and ex-officio) are not eligible.
  9. Those who attended either of the past two Smofcons are not eligible.
  10. All Scholarship recipients should report back to the Arisia Corporation by email what they learned and/or benefited from at Smofcon. [Note "should."] They are encouraged to share their report with the Eboard first. They may also give a verbal summary of their report at a Corporate Meeting in addition to sending email.
  11. All receipts must be submitted for reimbursement by March 31st of the following year. Any unused money will revert to unrestricted funds. [Note "must".]
  12. Scholarship funds may be advanced to scholarship recipients at the discretion of the Eboard.