A federal court ruled Thursday that the UW Roman Catholic Foundation cannot be recognized as a UW-Madison Registered Student Organization unless it changes its leadership to be more student-directed, according to UWRCF Director Tim Kruse.
The decision, reached during a preliminary injunction Thursday, wrestled over two points, Kruse said—that the university will not recognize UWRCF as an RSO first because it allegedly is only open to Roman Catholics and second because it is not controlled directly by students.
The federal court ruled in favor of UWRCF on the first point however, pointing to the UW System Board of Regents' decision in December that stated organizations can limit membership to students who affirm the organization's beliefs, such as political or religious ideologies.
""So that was good, although that was a moot point for us anyway, because we've never wanted to discriminate,"" Kruse said of UWRCF's membership. ""But at least now we won't have the university reinterpreting our bylaws.""
The court's ruling on the second point, Kruse said, was disappointing but not surprising. UWRCF, according to Kruse, has been willing to change its board membership all along, but a disagreement on the board forced it to wait until a judge gave the Foundation a specific number of students that must be on the board to be considered mostly controlled by students.
The court ruled Thursday that the UWRCF's leadership board must have at least six students on it to be considered for RSO status.
UWRCF secured approximately $250,000 in student segregated fees for the 2007-'08 academic year—if it obtains RSO status for next academic year, the funds will likely be disbursed to them, according to Kruse.
