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Fees and Fee Waivers

Where does Prairienet's money come from?

The Prairienet Community Network is an outreach service of the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Like many of the University's outreach programs, Prairienet is expected to 'earn its own way'. Most of Prairienet's annual budget consists of revenues from membership fees, grants, donations, and fee-based services.

Your organization's financial support will help us continue to offer low-cost, non-commercial, community-based Web and list hosting services to non-profit organizations in our community.

Paying by fee or donation

We offer two payment methods because many non-profits have to go through their boards to get permission to make a donation and find it easier to pay an invoice. Others prefer to make a donation.

Basic Web Hosting Account -- $35/year
Suitable for small groups and clubs with modest needs who do not require dialup Internet access, this account offers 10MB of Web space. Offers an organization email address plus a simplified Web address (no ~) and the option to request a subdomain, e.g., ourorganization.prairienet.org).
Standard Web Hosting Account -- $120/year
Suitable for most non-profit organizations. Includes 40MB Web space, 20 MB mail space, and 10 hrs/week dialup Internet access.
Advanced Web Hosting Account -- $180/year
Suitable for 501(c)(3) and public sector organizations wishing to have their own domain name.

The following suggested sliding scale fees are for larger, well-funded organizations that wish to support Prairienet at a higher level.

$300 fee (Annual budget between $50,001 - $100,000)
$480 fee (Annual budget above $100,000)

For details on what each type of account offers, please see the Web Hosting Comparison Chart.

Fee Waiver Policy

A limited number of fee waivers is available to qualifying non-profit organizations applying for Basic or Standard Web Hosting accounts. Fee waivers are supported by donations of Prairienet members and Information Providers and will be allocated to provide access and Web hosting to community non-profit organizations that are engaged in activities that benefit the community and that could otherwise not afford an account. For those groups that do not qualify for fee waivers, we recommend the Basic Web Hosting account ($35/year). Please note that Advanced Web Hosting accounts do not qualify for fee waivers.

To qualify for a fee waiver, an organization must meet the following four criteria:

The organization must be located in East Central Illinois.
The organization must be non-profit. It may be an public sector agency or a community organization. It may be a 501(c)(3), formal (elected officers and bylaws) or informal organization. (In general, clubs and membership organizations, with the exception of youth groups and PTAs, will not qualify unless their regular activities directly benefit the wider community.)
The organization must consist entirely of volunteers (no paid staff) and/or have a budget under $25,000 per year.
The organization's primary purpose must be to provide free or low-cost products, services or activities that benefit the larger community (may be in any area of community life, basic human services, recreational, educational, artistic, cultural, etc.).

Fee waiver accounts are given a uniform renewal date of January 1 and must be renewed annually.

Special Educational Fee Waivers

Special limited-time fee waivers are available for Basic or Standard Web hosting accounts for community-based class projects as follows:

Web hosting for non-profit organizations actively participating in the University of Illinois' Learning in Community (LINC) program
class project Web space for UIUC or Parkland students working on community-related Web projects (please specify course number and instructor)
class project Web space for high school students working on community-related Web projects (please have advisor or teacher inquire).

These special accounts are given a uniform renewal date of July 1.

If you have questions before you apply for your new account please e-mail

If you're ready, you can apply online for your new Prairienet account.

Included on this page:
Prairienet Funding
Fees and Donations
Fee Waivers
Student Fee Waivers