Pacific could benefit from a tech overhaul

posted in: Opinion | 0

Macbooks, iMacs, iPads, digital microscopes, digital cameras and camcorders; all of these are available to students at Pacific – if they are five years old. The College of Education’s Early Learning Community is staying technologically up to date for their preschool and kindergarten classes. For the rest of us the technology on campus is falling behind the times.

While digital cameras and iPads are not necessary to certain majors of studies, there is equipment necessary to departments that should have been replaced a while ago. An exercise science major complained that the equipment both in her classrooms and bio labs are well out of date. Currently, the exercise science lab’s metabolic cart, an item needed to measure things like oxygen consumption, is getting very old. Normally, a cart should last only about five years, but there have only been two in about the last 25 years.

A former bio student also commented about the lack of quality microscopes.  While newer models are clear and more helpful in classes, there is not always enough available for each student to use over several courses each semester.

In the media arts department, film majors learn to work with prehistoric cameras. Many have long lamented the need of newer equipment to better prepare for what they would be using out in the real world.

Residence halls, the 24-hour library center, Berglund and Jefferson Halls and the ELC all have safety system doors that take advantage of the Boxer Card electronic key feature, allowing only those faculty, staff and students with access to enter after a certain hour. Meanwhile, the University Center is still closed up every night and students forced to hang out or do work other places. What is supposed to be the heart of activity on campus skips a few beats every night from 1 a.m. to 6 a.m. because it’s too dangerous to keep open, both for students and the center. Simply upgrading the doors with the same technology that can already be found around over half the campus, could greatly improve students campus living experience.

Still though, for most Pacific students, faculty and staff the most outdated, difficult and perhaps frustrating piece of technology on the campus is the wireless internet.  With so many users on campus that rely on laptops as their main functioning computer, the wireless servers must be overloaded. At the time being, the current wireless situation is not well enough equipped to handle all the users on campus.

While Pacific is doing well at keeping the campus stocked with access to some needed technological items, such as relatively new computer labs, other sections are starting to fall behind. It could be time for the rest of the school to take a look at the ELC and opt for some upgrades to promote an environment that is up to par with today’s electronic advances.

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