First, you will need to decide if you will have an organization that is affiliated with a college / university / institution, or if you will start an org for a general area.
If you're going the General Area route, the best and easiest way to do this is to simply start meeting. Use official channels to promote your organization on any campuses you're trying to reach out to, and then just meet. You will have to decide if you're going to try for some kind of business status, through a DBA or another process, or if you're just creating a collective group of people. For the purposes of TAPS, please be sure the members you'll bring with you to the conference are actually enrolled college students that will represent your group with pride.
If you are going the route of an institution-affiliated organization, you'll have a bit of homework first. The first thing to do is find out what group on your campus registers student organizations. Once you find them, and they'll likely have a website, you'll need to find out what their requirements are for a student organization. At Texas State University, there are only a few things required to get started: 3 officers, a sponsor (faculty or staff), and a constitution. Texas State even provides a constitution template for organizations, so you don't need to understand parliamentary procedure and Robert's Rules in order to get started. If you want more help with constitutions, click here.
So, those are the basics of getting an org started. If you have questions, or are running into problems finding information, contact us and we'll see how we can help.
If you're going the General Area route, the best and easiest way to do this is to simply start meeting. Use official channels to promote your organization on any campuses you're trying to reach out to, and then just meet. You will have to decide if you're going to try for some kind of business status, through a DBA or another process, or if you're just creating a collective group of people. For the purposes of TAPS, please be sure the members you'll bring with you to the conference are actually enrolled college students that will represent your group with pride.
If you are going the route of an institution-affiliated organization, you'll have a bit of homework first. The first thing to do is find out what group on your campus registers student organizations. Once you find them, and they'll likely have a website, you'll need to find out what their requirements are for a student organization. At Texas State University, there are only a few things required to get started: 3 officers, a sponsor (faculty or staff), and a constitution. Texas State even provides a constitution template for organizations, so you don't need to understand parliamentary procedure and Robert's Rules in order to get started. If you want more help with constitutions, click here.
So, those are the basics of getting an org started. If you have questions, or are running into problems finding information, contact us and we'll see how we can help.
Additional Resources
Thought Co has some good information on starting groups and campus life:
https://www.thoughtco.com/start-your-own-pagan-study-group-2562611
https://www.thoughtco.com/surviving-campus-life-as-a-pagan-2561525
https://www.thoughtco.com/start-your-own-pagan-study-group-2562611
https://www.thoughtco.com/surviving-campus-life-as-a-pagan-2561525