Free SGA notebooks relieve students of extra expenses

By: Ed Komenda and Rob Amaefule

Posted: 8/29/08

More than 5,000 free notebooks will be given to Western Illinois University students by the Student Government Association, courtesy of the All By Students Notebooks company.

"The Office of Student Activities helped us unload 240 boxes of these notebooks that weighed around 25 pounds apiece," said SGA President Robert Dulski. "The notebooks will really help students save a lot of money this semester."

The five-subject notebooks were produced and delivered to SGA free of charge in early August, ensuring that a shipment would arrive before a bulk of the students returned for the fall semester.

According to Amy Kellenbach, former SGA director of Student Services, ABS redistributes funds that are used for promotional and advertising items to make notebooks for colleges and universities that request them. ABS had previously dispersed free notebooks to schools like Columbia College and Northwestern.

Kallenbach heard about the company's donations and was able to work closely with ABS during the spring semester to ensure her former group capitalized on the free opportunity.

"The process of igniting the whole thing was really smooth," said Kallenbach. "Once I called ABS and told them we were interested, we kept in touch and exchanged emails routinely, making sure both parties were on the same page."

In addition to keeping in contact with the notebook company, Kallenbach was responsible for writing and designing the first five pages of the notebook. The pages feature the SGA mission statement along with information concerning the organization's executive council, senate and standing committee. The notebook also contains a list of various organizations available at Western.

"We wanted to reach out to students on campus who really are not aware of what student government is or what we do," Kallenbach said. "That's why we had our mission statement and positions available for students interested in Student Council.

ABS was able to fund the SGA notebooks by placing advertisements through some of the pages. However SGA had a hand in what adverts was picked for the notebook.

"We had an active role in picking the advertisements, just to make sure all the little things were going to be ok with the school and to make sure they wouldn't advertise something that wouldn't be offensive to the university," Kallenbach said.

According to Erica Salin, a representative of ABS, the company is still fairly new and developing as a major distributer.

"Right now were are just focusing on five subject notebooks, and we actually started this program at Northwestern University where we gave out around ten thousand notebooks," said Erica Salin, representative of ABS Notebooks. "It was started by a Northwestern student, and the concept caught on quickly."

The year following the initial run at Northwestern, free notebooks were distributed at six additional campuses. According to Salin, ABS Notebooks now distributes free notebooks to a total of 65 campuses.

"We are reaching somewhere between 650 and 750 thousand students," Salin said. "It really works out for students, considering how expensive multi-subject notebooks are in schools today."

Salin said ABS Notebooks used a model that placed a single multi-subject notebook at around eight dollars, saving college students more than $5 million total.

SGA will be in the University Union on Wednesday, Sept. 3 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. passing out the notebooks and answering questions in regard to student government.