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“Wrapping Up” Requests for
Student Activities Fee Funding
How you word your requests can make a world of difference in the results

Yvonne Vinkemulder

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Imagine this scenario: You and your fellow leaders recognize that many younger students are eager for in-depth teaching from God’s word. You plan a Bible study conference with excellent teaching and special sessions for some students to learn leadership skills. You then apply for student activities fee (SAF) funding from your school to help cover the costs.

Would your chapter’s request be granted?

Perhaps. Perhaps not. It may depend on the “wrappings”: that is, how the chapter is perceived or how the request is packaged. If the university is concerned that you’re trying to leap over the fictitious wall of separation of church and state, the way the request is “wrapped” can make all the difference. The university can’t examine the contents of all your plans, but it may be able to deny the request based on how the chapter is perceived, or how the request is presented.

This was the issue faced a few years ago by Wide Awake Publications1, a journal published by three University of Virginia students. The way WAP was packaged made a difference.

The Wide Awake Package

WAP’s founders packaged it well. The transparent wrappings did not in the least obscure their Christian character and beliefs. They’d applied for student organization status as a publication, one of 15 student journals on campus. WAP’s purpose was couched in language consistent with the University’s educational mission: to publish “a magazine of philosophical and religious expression . . . to facilitate discussion which fosters an atmosphere of sensitivity to and tolerance of Christian viewpoints, and to provide a unifying focus for Christians of multicultural backgrounds” (emphasis added).

They then applied for SAF funding—and were turned down.

The three founders went to court—all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court—claiming that their request was denied solely because of the journal’s religious editorial viewpoint.

Just the Facts . . .

Like many colleges and universities, UVA collected a nominal “student activities fee” from registering students to be allocated to recognized student groups for a broad range of extracurricular activities. It applied the same criteria evenhandedly to all applicants.

Well, almost all applicants! It denied funding to WAP, arguing that funding a journal with religious content would cause it to become entangled in the establishment of religion.

The Supreme Court2 disagreed and found instead that the University’s action abridged the students’ First Amendment guarantee of free speech. The following facts were significant:

SAF’s purpose was to support a broad range of extracurricular student activities related to the educational mission of the University.

Student groups were independent private associations, neither part of the University nor controlled by it.

WAP registered as a journal. (UVA did not grant status to religious organizations.)

Religious, political and philanthropic activities were not eligible for UVA SAF support.

Religious activity “primarily promotes or manifests a particular belief in or about a deity or an ultimate reality.” (Publication of a journal is a secular, not religious, activity even if its purpose and content are religious.)

The Student Council authorized disbursement of SAF, subject to review by a faculty body.

The University, through the Student Council, made payments to third-party contractors, not to the student groups applying for funds.

The University abandoned its position that granting funds to WAP would entangle it in establishment of religion under the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. Instead it argued that such a grant would defeat “the ability of public education . . . to control the use of public funds.”

The resulting opinion is fascinating—as much for what it does not say as for what it does.

What the Court Said

The Court immediately reiterated a framework of fundamental principles.

First, government may not regulate speech based on the substantive content or the message conveyed by others.

Second, in targeting religious views, the university engaged in “viewpoint discrimination,” that is, discrimination between private groups by favoring some private viewpoints and disfavoring others. The university’s action could not be justified.

Granting WAP request for funds would not defeat public education, as the University claimed, but in refusing the request, the University abandoned its educational mission. As a “marketplace of ideas” it is to be a forum for free and creative inquiry, for experimentation and exploration of wide ranging intellectual and philosophic ideas. It abandons that mission if it uses its influence and power to favor and encourage some viewpoints while suppressing or casting its disapproval on others. On the other hand, giving students equal opportunity to express their particular beliefs enhances the educational mission.

Third, the Court dealt with the argument that “direct monetary subsidization of religious organizations and projects” created a risk that the university would be entangled in religion. So long as it followed neutral criteria and evenhanded policies there was no risk. The University’s program was neutral: it made room for broad and diverse ideologies and viewpoints and SAF opened “a forum for speech and support [of] various student enterprises, including publication of newspapers, in recognition of the diversity and creativity of student life.” WAP, a student journal, fit squarely within the concept of a forum for speech. Furthermore, SAF was neither designed to advance religion nor to aid a religious cause; any resulting benefit to religion was incidental, and therefore permissible.

The Court identified several safeguards against entanglement in religion.

1. The Court distinguished student activity fees from general tax revenues, thus successfully bypassing any question of government funding for religion. The SAF was not a tax. No tax had been levied upon the public for the “sole and exclusive purpose of establishing and supporting specific sects.”

Furthermore, the University did not commingle SAF with its own funds, but set them aside in a special fund from which recognized private student associations can draw to finance those [extracurricular] activities that are consistent with the University’s educational mission.

2. SAF grants to WAP would, at most, have an incidental benefit to religion because the University distanced itself from private student groups by paying third-parties to provide secular services that the University itself might otherwise provide. This is comparable to granting student groups religion-neutral access to use University facilities. Thus the Court extended, rather than limited, its previous equal access decisions.

In disbursing funds to third parties, the University also insulated itself from supervisory responsibilities and maintenance costs related to the student activity. This reinforced the Court’s position that no public funds flowed “directly to WAP’s coffers.” And since WAP was registered as a student publication for expression of ideas, not as a religious organization, there was no danger of Establishment Clause violation as there might be if tax monies were used to pay a church’s bills.

3. The Court identified a crucial difference between government speech endorsing religion, which the Establishment Clause forbids, and private speech endorsing religion, which the Free Speech and Free Exercise [of religion] Clauses protect. The University expressly disassociated itself from the independent private student groups it recognized; in so doing, it also disassociated itself from the groups’ speech and expression.

In summary, the Court held that the University’s viewpoint discrimination both denied the right of free speech and risked nurturing a “pervasive bias or hostility to religion, which could undermine the very neutrality the Establishment Clause requires.” Since there was no risk of collision between the Establishment and Free Speech Clauses, the University was required to administer the SAF in an evenhanded viewpoint-neutral way.

What the Court Didn’t Say

The Supreme Court did not say that universities should use SAF to fund religious student groups. Because WAP was packaged as a journal to facilitate discussion, the Court could skirt UVA policies that prohibited it from recognizing religious groups or funding religious, political or philanthropic activities. It was not WAP’s beliefs or editorial viewpoint, but the character of its activities (i.e., publishing a journal) that the Court legitimately examined.

The Court did not say that universities should use SAF to fund religious activities. It said that publishing a journal is not a religious activity. Neither are lectures, discussions, socials, concerts, leadership training, etc.

Back to the Future

What likelihood is there that your InterVarsity group can receive SAF funding for a proposed conference?

WAP’s experience makes it clear that Christian student groups can transparently express their views if they carefully package and tailor their purpose and activities to fit within the university’s marketplace of ideas. In protecting the form of expression of speech, the Constitution also protects the core issues of belief.

How would you present your organization? As an association of university students that engages in, and facilitates discussion on, religious expression? Or as a religious club? The former is squarely in line with the university’s educational mission: it fosters creative inquiry and exploration of intellectual and philosophical ideas. The latter is not.

How would you present your project? As a Bible conference? Or a conference to stimulate exploration of Biblical teaching and to train Christian student leaders to lead small group Bible discussions? A conference is a “secular” activity. Exploration of biblical teaching and training student leaders to lead small group Bible discussions would be consistent with the university’s educational mission. The nature of the secular activity, and the content of the teaching and discussion would lie outside of the university’s rightful realm of inquiry.

By the way, the InterVarsity chapter that requested funds for a Bible study conference lost out; funding was not granted. On the other hand, the chapter that asked for financial assistance to send their members to an InterVarsity leadership conference received it (because a leadership conference is a secular activity) even though the college was fully aware that it would be a Christian leadership conference.

The wrappings around the request made the difference.