In response to the Penn State administration's plans to form a programming board that would work alongside the University Park Allocations Committee (UPAC), some student leaders reacted with skepticism, while others saw potential in the plan.

Shauna Moser, chairwoman of Young Americans for Freedom (YAF), said instituting a new programming board would compromise the mission of her organization.

"We are extremely worried," Moser said. "It looks like they're going to take away the potential for UPAC to allocate large sums of money for large honoraria for speakers."

Administrators from the Division of Student Affairs have met with students chosen by Student Affairs Vice President Vicky Triponey twice so far and plan to meet each Monday afternoon to review prospective details of the new programming board.

Moser said she does not think students are being kept as informed as they should be.

"I feel that most student groups don't know that this is happening, and once they realize that it is, and how it's going to affect the way they run their clubs, they'll be very upset," Moser said.

Keyur Shah, UPAC overall chairman, said the weekly student-administrator meetings would produce a constitution for the new programming board by

April. At that point, he said, it would be passed along to Triponey, who would review it with Penn State President Graham Spanier.

Shaira Morales, UPAC's student contact team chairwoman, said the best way for students to stay informed of the group's planning procedures would be for them to attend an open forum that it is planning to hold soon, though no exact date has been set.

"We would urge students to go to these open forums," Morales said.

Vicky Cangelosi, chairwoman of the College Republicans, said that she thinks it is going to be much harder for conservative student groups to get funding once the new programming board is in place. She added that she believes the administrators involved in the planning are partly motivated to ensure that liberal groups have an easier time getting funding.

"The administrators who are behind this are the same administrators who have tried to silence conservative programs on campus in the past," Cangelosi said. "This needs to be a student-initiated change, not an administration or university-initiated change."

Ed Rowe, Allies president, said there is a lot of potential for a new programming board at Penn State, but it is critical that Student Affairs seek broad student representation and have open dialogue.

Mike Tomaselli, HUB-Robeson Center Advisory Board chairman, said Judy Albin, senior associate director of unions and student activities, made a presentation near the end of last semester to the advisory board about the new programming board. Tomaselli said she described it as something that would help students plan their programs.

"They're sort of taking part of programming away from the students," Tomaselli said. "Even if it's unintentionally, they'd be imposing their will."

Darryl Watson, vice president of the Black Caucus, said he does not know enough about the programming board to accurately comment either way.

Penn State College Democrats President Alex Smith said that he had not heard anything about the new programming board.

"We haven't done anything with UPAC this year," he said.

Smith added that anything that would make UPAC more accessible to students would be beneficial.

Moser said she plans to work with leaders of other student groups and possibly coordinate a protest. Cangelosi said the College Republicans has not yet discussed the matter as a group.

"If I were on UPAC, I would not be happy about this," Cangelosi said.

Collegian Staff Writer Meaghan Haugh contributed to this article.