At the beginning of this year, each Auburn student paid an $808 student services fee in addition to his or her tuition.
Tuition rates vary according to a student’s major and whether a student is an Alabama resident.
The student services fee, however, is the same for everyone.
Walker Byrd, SGA president, said a small amount of money per student adds up in the end.
"When you think about 26,000 students who are paying for this, it comes out to a lot," Byrd said.
Byrd said SGA has the most say in the student activities portion of the fee.
The student activities fee was originally $19, but it was increased to $45 in 2012.
Roughly 39 percent of that $45 goes to UPC, 21 percent goes to student media, 6 percent goes to community service, 6 percent goes to leadership and ethics, 8 percent goes to student organizations and welcome week, 5 percent for intercultural programming and 15 percent goes to SGA, according to Byrd.
Byrd said any student organization can request money from the student activities fee.
“We know based on enrollment and based on the $45 fee, we have a set amount we have to get to," Byrd said. "The requests often come in much higher than that.”
Corey Edwards, SGA programs adviser, said the $45 student activity fee is assessed every year.
"Those activities include everything we have over in our office of student involvement," Edwards said. "It supports around 500 registered student organizations we have out there. Last year it came out to about $2.349 million. That money is allocated out to the groups."
The wellness center fee was raised from $100 to $150 in 2011, and then to $200 in 2012.
Ted Trupp, associate director of recreation programs, said the increases financed the $72 million Auburn University Recreation and Wellness Center, which opened in 2013.
SGA formed a wellness center committee in 2008, according to Trupp.
“The idea was to come up with what we needed for the recreation center at Auburn University,” Trupp said. “The architects went to work to figure out how much it would cost to do what we wanted to do.”
Trupp said SGA held a referendum in 2009 and 74 percent of students voted to increased the fee to $200.
The fee was increased $50 a year starting in 2009. It was capped at $200 in 2012. Trupp said there has been no fee increase since then.
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