I could not sort out whether to put this under business model or funding as it covers both. As a club, the Curtin campus community garden is in a unique position to secure an outcome. This means it would become a club under Curtin Student Guild. There are both advantages and disadvantages with this model and it is only through personal experience that I can explain both. To start a club, there needs to be 10 founding members with a committee made up of at least a President, Secretary and Treasurer. There also needs to be a club constitution. When you send in an expression of interest to Curtin Student Guild they send folders of information on what needs to be done to make it happen. A prime advantage of a community garden run by students as a club is the extra funding available on top of what is already available.

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There are, however, some glaring disadvantages for students to run the garden as a club. Every year, there needs to be an AGM, with a minimum of 10 students attending and a new committee needs to step up. If there are no candidates or officers, the club may dissolve. Running a club is time consuming and exhausting. There are meetings every fortnight and events to be planned. Then there are the usual rounds of conflicts that arise, as well. Students may want to join the club, but they may not want to run the club because of these factors.

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Running the garden as a club may have some advantages and cut through the tape faster than waiting for a different business model and approval from faculties. It has its drawbacks. As a final drawback, I am not in a position to recruit anybody or even pitch at students to become the founding members of a club. I tried to start an astronomy club 1 year ago by reaching out to all my networks and in the end I was 1 person short of starting it. It is an awful lot of work to establish when you lack the support, the network and the know-how to bring the people on-board.