Students reluctant to spend their holiday cash on school supplies the first week of school may have lucked out. The Student Government Senate purchased an additional 200 Turning Point clickers for students to rent from Middleton Library, free of charge. These clickers are often mandatory for students taking biology and chemistry courses, and students use them for in-class quizzes, surveys and attendance purposes. Without clicker participation for such assessments, most professors do not give students credit. Scheduled for distribution Tuesday, students can wait in line at the Circulation Desk for a free clicker before spending $46 at the LSU Union Bookstore or $40 at Co-Op Bookstore on Burbank Drive. “Turning Point Clickers has agreed to rush us the clickers as soon as possible, hopefully by the end of the week,” said Student Senate Speaker Colorado Robertson. The clickers come just in time as the library already rented the initial 66 clickers the Senate allotted for student use in fall 2007. Robertson said he found the 66 clickers this past year while cleaning a drawer in the office. The Senate initially purchased the clickers in 2006 to provide an electronic voting system for Senate meetings. But shortly after senators banned the unsuccessful voting method, the clickers were stowed away in a drawer until Robertson took office. “I felt this would be directly effective for the students,” he said. Robertson amended a proposal to allocate a portion of the student required fees to the rental program during one of the Student Required Fee Committee meetings in the fall. He said the rentals are free, unless a student fails to return the clicker by the final day of class. Michael Pomes, marketing senior, said he no longer plans to buy a clicker now that he is aware of the rental program. “This is very convenient because I was going to pay $40 to press one button about five times throughout the whole semester,” Pomes said. “I showed my professor my old clicker from two years ago, and he said they are no longer using that type.” Meghan Dauzat, biology freshman, said she wishes she would have known about the rentals prior to purchasing her clicker for biology in fall 2007. “I would’ve done that instead of wasting $40,” Dauzat said. “It will help college students who don’t have a lot of money to spend. Books are so pricey, it is pointless to have a $40 clicker when you can rent one.” Robertson said SG plans to began a campaign this semester for students to donate unused clickers to the SG office. He said the campaign aims to target upperclassmen who no longer use them. “Hopefully we can have the pot grow,” he said. “If anybody has any clickers and they are not using them anymore, they can drop them off by the SG office.” Dauzat said she intends to donate her clicker once she no longer needs it for her biology and chemistry courses. “If we can’t sell them back, there’s no need for me to have one,” she said.
—-Contact Natalie Messina at [email protected]