$2.69.
As part of a $20,000-plus tuition bill it hardly seems worth mentioning, but to the Michigan Student Assembly it is the most important figure on campus - for now.
It is the student fee MSA collected from each student to create this year's $205,000 budget.
MSA currently collects the fifth highest student government fee in the Big Ten - and it soon may go up.
This November, students voting in the MSA elections will decide whether that figure should be increased by $1.50 to fund two student groups, Project Serve and the Black Volunteer Network.
In addition, another ballot question may be in the works that would make the fee even higher.
MSA's executive officers hope that in the near future, students will have a chance to vote to increase the student fee again - this time to provide additional funding for MSA's budget.
"We need more money for the MSA budget as a whole, our budget has not kept up with the rate of inflation and can't even cover things like our operating costs," said MSA President Fiona Rose.
The MSA budget has been operating under a surplus for three years. The budget's status has mandated that the assembly rely on money left over from the previous year's budget, while at the same time budgeting to ensure a surplus for the next year.
"It is not fiscally responsible to depend on money left over from last year," Rose said. "We are still in the dark ages of student fees for student government at Michigan - we've been so concentrated on keeping the fee low that we have allowed no healthy revenue growth for the assembly."
Rose said MSA would need at least a 50-cent student fee increase to end the surplus spending.
MSA Vice President Probir Mehta said a student fee increase enlarging MSA's budget would ultimately come back to the students.
"A fee increase will directly benefit students themselves," Mehta said. "We want to add to our funds, which will then go back to students and recycle into the campus."
Mehta said the amount of money in the assembly's budget has been declining steadily. "In the past, we were getting more money in real terms," he said.
This year's $2.69 is down from last year's $2.94 student fee.
Around the Big Ten, students at Michigan State University, the University of Wisconsin and Northwestern University pay more than students at the University of Michigan.
At Michigan State, students automatically pay $10 per term to the student government, but that money is refundable.
"An interesting facet of our fee is that it is refundable," said Frank Aiello, chair of Associated Students of Michigan State. "If students don't like what we are doing, they can get their money back."
Only student governments at Pennsylvania State University and Purdue University do not collect any sort of student fee. Both governments raise their own internal funds and receive some indirect university funding.
But at a time when MSA would like to see its fee increased, student government fees at other conference schools have gone down.
At the University of Illinois, the student government receives $1 per term from all students on campus, said Student Body President Michael Siska. That fee is down from the $2 fee the government collected until this year.
"Some people think the student government doesn't have enough money to operate properly now that our fee has been decreased," Siska said. "But I think we're fine."
Rose said MSA deserved a larger student fee regardless of what other Big Ten schools pay.
"I'm not into comparing apples and oranges," she said. "The fact is, we have a lot of needs on campus and our current budget is not providing adequate funds for those needs."
Some students said funding increases to support both MSA and Project Serve and the Black Volunteer Network is a good idea.
"I think they both need the money," said Jen Trudell, an LSA first-year student. "I would support any increase as long as it's not an inordinate amount."
Others said $2.69 was just not a big deal. "$2.69 doesn't sound like too high a fee," said Tara Koster, an LSA first-year student. "An increase sounds like it would be OK."
Rose acknowledged that asking students to increase their own fee by $1.50 this year will make it tougher to ask for another fee increase on behalf of the assembly's budget.
"We are talking about two fee increases which may seem like a lot of money, but we are talking about two distinctly different causes," Rose said. "I hope students will not just see these as fee increases, but see these as two worthy causes."
Even if students do pass fee increases this November, the extra charges will have to be approved by the University's Board of Regents.
Members of the board said it was too early to tell whether they would approve any sort of fee increase.
"I have no idea whether I would support such a resolution or not," said Regent Philip Power (D-Ann Arbor). "I would have to know all of the facts involved before I could make a decision."
Last March, students voted to create a separate student fee of $1.84 for Student Legal Services, and in past years they have voted to increase the student fee to fund the Ann Arbor Tenant's Union.
Rose said the rash of fee-increase ballot questions could be blamed on the complicated process required to increase the student fee.
"We've had quite a few (ballot questions) in the past few years and it has to do with the difficulty in increasing the fee," Rose said. "We have to jump through so many hoops that it is something that always seems to come up again and again."