Issue 49, Fall 2011

Reduced Student Printing Quotas Prefix Reduced Printing

by Rob Galbraith

Beginning this quarter students were allocated a reduced printing quota of $1.25 (25 black and white prints) per quarter. As of October 24, student printing had decreased about 60% over the same period last year. So far this fall, 10,885 students printed 315,951 pages, compared with 12,188 students printing 791,709 pages by the same date last fall. About 7,500 of the 10,855 students who printed during this period, had not yet exceeded their quota.

When students need to print beyond their quota they can pay for additional pages at one of three “Print Deposit Stations” located on the first and second floor of HH or on the second level of AW. These stations accept bills and coins and then instantly credit the student’s print balance. Deposits are maintained for as long as the student is enrolled. Students can also pay for prints online using a VISA or MasterCard at https://wwu.pcounterwebpay.com/.  There is a $1.00 fee for each credit card transaction to cover bank and service provider charges. Starting summer quarter 2012 all student printing will be on a pay-per–print basis.

Some students have reported that faculty provide electronic files, often on Blackboard, and request that students print out these documents. This will now incur a direct cost to students for printing these articles and other documents. An option to consider is having the articles pre-printed and available as course packs in the bookstore (call the Copyright/Coursepack office at x7435, or http://west.wwu.edu/atus/copyright/index.shtml ). This option also provides copyright clearance should you need it. An additional advantage to some students is that the cost might be covered under an allowance for textbooks. Requiring the students to print them directly comes straight out of their pocketbooks.

ATUS is working on adding additional printing services that have been requested by students. Future plans include making color printing available to students on both north and south campus and adding the technology to allow students to print from their own laptop computers and other mobile devices.

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