The Graduate School Advisory Council begins each school year with expenses exceeding its budget. So Mike Rudy, GSAC president and political science major, proposed to the Student Senate Wednesday a raise of the fee for full-time graduate students to $1.

The organization is currently funded by a $1 fee for graduate students are assessed each semester, but the extra dollar would bring the budget to about $5,000, an increase from the current $2,800 budget and yearly $3,600 expenses, Rudy said.

“The budget is already in the hole … so we have very little money per semester,” he said.

Rudy said the extra fee could help GSAC organize social events and reach out to the community.

“There’s a whole lot of potential for it. It would just really help the organization flourish,” he said. “One of the big things is it brings us out of the red.”

He said the National Association of Graduate Professional Students holds a conference annually, and much of GSAC’s budget funds the expense of at least one graduate student to attend the conference.

Rudy said this year, three students will go because the conference is in St. Louis, and airfare will not be an included expense.

Rudy said the extra fee will help implement the ideas GSAC brings back from the conference, along with community involvement such as creating Easter baskets for homeless, clothing and food drives and bringing more speakers to campus.

He said the fee was not proposed sooner because fee increases normally have to be proposed to the senate Tuition and Fee Review committee by November, which did not provide GSAC enough time to prepare a presentation.

GSAC’s proposal will be considered this year in January, along with other eligible fee increases campus groups such as Sports and Recreation or Textbook Rental, said Tuition and Fee Review committee chair Jennifer Lampley.

She said there were nine eligible fee increases last year, but not all proposed increases could be granted, partly because of fee caps.

Lampley said the fees will not be approved until January because of elections in November and the uncertain future of Eastern’s budget.

“They might not get everything they ask for. I think everyone needs money right now,” she said. She added that if the group doesn’t get the whole dollar, they should get a portion of that amount.

The current dollar allocation to GSAC has been in place since 1991.

“They seem like a very beneficial group that could benefit the campus,” Lampley said.