Year in Review - 2023-2024

Highlights of 2023-2024

  • Funded so many amazing campus and community initiatives

  • Doubled the size of the Food Justice Garden, in partnership with Martin Luther University College and the Centre for Earth Consciousness and Gender Justice

  • Created & launched the Gender Euphoria Zine

  • Met countless new volunteers and members of our communities

  • Brantford LSPIRG Lounge now a cozy, welcoming space for activities

  • LSPIRG Board & Staff received intensive training this year, alongside PIRGs across Ontario. Topics covered include conflict transformation, internal decolonization, anti-oppression, consensus-based decision making, and direct action, among others

Programming

  • Continued operating the Free Weekly Distro program in partnership with Martin Luther University College

    • Up to 200 students attended our program each week for their supplies

    • 1 out of 4 students say they get ALL of their food from the program

    • Collaborating with The Mini Market at a new location, with the goal of serving students better

  • Ran the Hot Meal Campaign in partnership with Lonnie’s to provide meals to community members weekly in Brantford at the Grand River Community Health Centre

  • Ran in-person and virtual workshops on wide array of social and environmental justice issues, including menstrual equity, sustainable periods, learning to sew, collage-making, climate justice, food sovereignty, botany, growing micro-greens and saving seeds.

  • Collaborated on large community events such as the Belonging Brant ABCD Symposium

  • Responded to hate and fascism on and off campus

  • In an unprecedented circumstance where a core student volunteer faced deportation, we raised $11,000 in a mutual aid campaign to support them

Our Research and Action Groups

  • Revitalizing Our Sustenance Project

  • Shamrose for Syrian Culture

  • Food Not Bombs

  • KW Urban Harvester

  • Excavators Arts Collective

Research

  • Collaborated on second survey asking for students’ feedback on accessing menstrual products on campus

  • Supported research and knowledge mobilization for increasing LGBTQ+ resilience on and off-campus. An undergraduate thesis mapping project by: Emily Rank, Christopher Hewitt, and Ketan Shankardass

  • Hosted a workshop by Jennifer Dobai, mobilizing her PhD research on Eco-Feelings

  • Started collecting (anonymous) data on LSPIRG Distro to improve program

Alt Text FINANCES

Sept 2023 - Aug 2024 Budget Actuals

Income

  • WLU Funding (from Undergrad and Grad students on the Waterloo and Brantford campuses and Kitchener Location): $296,992.98

  • Community Memberships: $229

Total Income $297,221.98

Administrative expenses (Sep 23 - Aug 24)

  • General Administrative Total: $37,366.77

    • Liability insurance and contents coverage for the Board of Directors - ($4,330.68)

    • Bookkeeping and accounting. Part-time bookkeeper and fees for necessary year-end financials ($10,848.00)

    • Ontario PIRG and provincial network fees ($10,203.67)

    • Other expenses including website fees, computer software (Zoom, GSuite and Adobe Creative Cloud), office supplies, printing, bank charges, staff/Board travel, and postage. ($11,984.42)

  • Advertising and Promotion: $3,281.72

  • Payroll Expenses Total: $:143,809.40 Staff health and LTD plans ($5775.00), Taxes ($10,216.08), Wages - Two full-time and one part-time staff ($126,270.25), WSIB ($1,548.07)

Programming + Co-Sponsorship Expenses

  • Semesterly funding requests for campus and community initiatives ($4,922.79)

    • Research and Action Groups semesterly funding - 6 groups ($8,533.20)

    • Distro ($9,087.63)

    • Irregular Programming Brantford/Waterloo ($6,621.99)

    • Other events and programming (Food Justice Garden, Resource Library etc): $3,644.65

    • Total spent on programming ($32,810.26)

  • Donations and External Funding

  • Distro estimated value of food collected and distributed ($92,190.00)

  • Distro program Expenses (paid through grants and donations via Luther) ($62,713.70)

  • Events and Programming Total: $187,713.96

Increase in programming expenditures since last AGM: $12,955.68

Funding we provided to campus and community initiatives

We provide one-time funding requests for up to $750. The following projects are the ones we supported over the course of the last year.

  • Friendsgiving potluck & Fundraiser 

  • Queer bucket drumming 

  • WildFlower Finds

  • Shaping justice: the philosophical roots of Black social justice movements workshop 

  • Mask 4 Mask Speed Friending

  • Tour Around Asia Night Market

  • MaskBlocWR zine 

  • Sexworker Mutual Aid Fund 

  • IJV-WR Community Engagement Support 

  • Fight Back KW - Shelter Building Project / Sandbag House Proto-Type at 100Vic encampment

  • Queer community quilt project 

  • Neurodivergent Artists Collective

  • Willow river centre’s 4th annual winter solstice feast

  • “We Are All Connected” Project Re-Print

Goals for the coming year

  • Provide more project-based employment opportunities for students

  • Prioritize local Indigenous solidarity work

  • Foster artistic expression as resistance

  • Tangibly support international students and newcomers with advocacy and programming

  • Get greenhouse for Food Justice Garden

  • Expand and relaunch our Resource and Rad Libraries

  • Suggestions from LSPIRG members: begin greenhouse growing throughout the winter with KW Urban Harvester, and support more consciousness-raising activities and groups, host teach-ins, book clubs around social justice, organize around mutual aid, how to survive without the system, and overall improve knowledge mobilization