This letter is to briefly respond to Ryan Silvola’s editorial, “Printing costs not as Augie advertised” from the April 30 issue of the Observer.

Ryan mentioned having printed 3,122 pages; if so, that represents over 6 reams of paper.  We know that most students do not print this much, and most also do not reach their quota.

We tracked printing statistics for two years before instituting the printing credit system, and set it at a level such that 90% of students would be covered solely by the included balance.

Last year and prior, we charged 25 cents per page for color and 6 cents for a black and white page, and issued a $100 credit.

Last summer, the college migrated to a new print vendor, OMC, and modified our costs per page to 6 cents for color and 2 cents for black and white, with a $50 credit for each student.

So, students can actually print more with the reduced initial credit of $50 this year than they could last year with the $100 credit.  Likewise, the $5 top-up cards give students much more for their dollar than in previous years.

I agree that faculty should allow students to use tablets or laptops to access materials provided on Moodle.  I also believe that if you pointed out the benefits for you and fellow students as well as the environment, that faculty would be receptive.  Tablets such as iPads or Kindles can be less intrusive in the classroom and are a good solution for accessing documents quickly.

Our goal in ITS is to enable reasonable levels of academic printing while still being good stewards of college resources and the environment.  With cooperation from everyone, I believe we can achieve that goal.

Shawn Beattie

ITS Support Services Manager