Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. I listened to the rhythm of my finger tapping the mouse for one hour and three minutes Sunday night. Each click refreshed the page with same disheartening message, “Sorry, all available registration sessions are in use. Keep Trying!” The large type encouragement to continue to hit the “schedule request” link soon became agitating as the words blurred together on the page that stood between me and the perfect schedule. Scheduling woes are not a new thing. Every semester the stress level of students across campus rises as they unsuccessfully try for hours to make PAWS cooperate. Can anything done to stop this scheduling torture? The University collects more than a million dollars in technology fees. How much can a few hundred more scheduling sessions cost? I know the University has a committee to decide how the tech fee will be spent, but I have a few suggestions of my own. I’d start by buying whatever is necessary to have more scheduling sessions. And if they can’t be bought, then maybe they can improve the awful page students have to stare at while waiting to schedule. Maybe it could have some type of entertainment to accompany it such as riddles or jokes. They could be randomly displayed and would change every time the viewer hits the refresh button. Anything to make the process more tolerable. And I would bring back REGGIE, the phone line students could call to schedule that was shut down in the fall. Prior to the death of REGGIE I used the phone line to schedule every semester. I once scheduled while shopping for clothes at the mall. If more students knew how quick and efficient it was, I’m sure the demand would increase. Then I would buy more rental laptops for the library. The ability to check out a laptop with wireless access is a great opportunity. More people should be able to take advantage of the service. I would work to purchase a music downloading program. The University recently sent a broadcast e-mail warning students against illegally downloading music. Many other universities have made music downloading sites available to students to try to combat illegal downloading. This University could institute a similar program.
—–Ginger is lobbying for REGGIE. Contact her at [email protected]