FOLLOWING AN assembly last June 23 regarding the Student Entrepreneurship Initiative (SEI), Council of Organizations of the Ateneo President Gigi de Villa opened further discussion of recommendations and proposals for SEI in the Sanggunian Central Board (CB) meeting Friday, July 13.
De Villa presented the perspectives of the administration, organizations, and stall and business owners from the John Gokongwei School of Management Student Enterprise Center (JSEC) and the School of Management Business Accelerator (Somba) so that these may be taken into consideration in creating the recommendations and proposals.
“For two years, ‘yung policy lang is may one student-owned [stall] sa bazaar (For two years, the only policy is that there should be one student owned stall in bazaars),” De Villa said. “Pero this year, ie-enforce siya [SEI] strictly (This year, [SEI] will be enforced strictly).”
A summary of the administration’s position, after previous discussions with Loyola Schools Bookstore Director and SEI Coordinator William Mallari and former Vice President for the Loyola Schools Ma. Assunta Cuyegkeng, were then presented.
The administration sees the SEI as an “opportunity for outside the classroom learning,” wherein students will learn “to enhance and practice leadership and organizational skills” while earning at the same time.
Mediocre projects, having the “same old income-generating” projects, and taking only a “commissioner’s job,” wherein students let concessionaires rent out stalls and in turn receive part of the profit, were cited as some of the administration’s concerns as to why they decided to strictly implement the SEI this year.
Other comments from the administration noted that students must also “learn beyond their field” and that organizations should “explore other ways to earn funds” as opposed to the usual bazaar.
Student organizations argue, however, that the implementation of the SEI would limit their training and exposure.
De Villa said that dealing with outside concessionaires trains the organizations to be more professional in dealing with other groups.
“They also said that if all [concessionaires] were students, how would they learn professionalism if [the people the students will be dealing with] are ‘just my fellow students, my fellow orgmates,’” De Villa said in Filipino.
She said that bazaars also aid the organizations in forging corporate relations with outside companies and concessionaires. Consequently, these will open new perspectives for the organizations outside of what is within the Ateneo campus.
Another comment from organizations is that the SEI will overlap with JSEC and JSEC Challenge. De Villa said that organizations see having students own or run their own stalls or businesses during bazaars as similar to the concept of JSEC.
According to De Villa, a study was conducted wherein 63.2% of JSEC stall owners and 100% of Somba participants were interviewed regarding the SEI.
JSEC stall owners said that, given the implementation of SEI, they would be willing to participate in the bazaars because it would increase their brand exposure, their experience and provide them with additional revenue.
However, they also said that they would not participate in bazaars because it would mean additional costs. “So imagine, they already have a permanent stall in JSEC, and then they’ll have to provide additional equipment and employees if ever they participate in a bazaar,” De Villa said.
Somba participants also cited similar reasons for wanting to participate in bazaars. However, they would not participate given that Ateneans are not the primary target market for their products.
It was also found that JSEC stall owners would, 48% of the time, be willing to participate in the projected number of 20 bazaars to be held this year. Somba participants, on the other hand, would be willing to participate in the bazaars 41% of the time.
Given the three different perspectives of the administration, organizations and JSEC and Somba participants, proposals were crafted and presented to the CB for comments and recommendations.
Some of these proposals included providing incentives for student-owned businesses, implementing a percentage system in getting concessionaires for bazaars (i.e., 60% student-run, 40% outside concessionaires), limiting the frequency of getting the same concessionaire, increasing student involvement (i.e., using a centralized payment scheme), providing a support system for the student-run businesses, and as a “last resort,” lobbying for gradual implementation of the SEI instead.
A meeting regarding the SEI will take place Friday, July 20, wherein the proposals and recommendations from the CB meeting will be discussed with Mallari.
