Stockton is going through some serious changes this year: one of them being our Printer Points that we always appreciated as students, and that TALONS even boasted about to prospective new students on tours. Free printing was one of the many great things about Stockton. Previously, undergraduates would receive 1600 printer points per semester and 50 color points for the entire four years, but on August 29, Stockton sent out an email about the changes to this system.

The email announced that ITS was now introducing Papercut, which ensured “Consistency and Reliability,” “Interactive Dashboard,” “Enhanced Mobile Print Features,” and “Flexible Printing Funds.” Under the latter, the email stated, “Say goodbye to printer restrictions! Allocated funds will be provided upfront to meet your dynamic printing needs. Funds are no longer restricted by printer type (ex: Color, B&W, etc.).” Even professors are affected by this change in the system and have allocated funds themselves.

The system dictates that Black and White pages cost $0.016 a page and Color pages cost $0.07 a page. ITS stated: Despite this, many students have already burned through dollars worth of pages. On the Stockton website, it also states: “Blank pages printed will cost the same as a normal page from whichever type of printer is in use.” I was dismayed when I printed some pages for a class and found that I was charged for two pages each rather than one page, even though all of them only had text on one side. Come to find out, the printer thought I was printing on both sides of each page, even though the other side was blank, and I was charged for both sides. One fellow Arts and Humanities student also commented on this new rule, expressing, “It is ridiculous that we have to pay for blank pages! What are they losing, imaginary ink? This is just another way that Stockton is ripping us off by charging us for pages we’re not even printing out. It almost feels like they don’t truly care about us and our needs as students, especially since the professors keep demanding printed work knowing [we only have 50 dollars] now!”

Most students did not see the initial email, given that it was still summer when it was sent out, and those that did merely thought that it would be easier to spend points now that Color and B&W points were no longer separated. “Allocated funds” are mentioned, but unless one clicks on the links provided below, most wouldn’t see how much they have in their allocated funds. When the school year started, most students found this unfortunate news out through word of mouth, or from the sign taped above the printers in the C/D Atrium Library that largely goes unnoticed. Unless one goes to the stockton.edu website and looks up “Printing,” most wouldn’t know until much later that their pages are a lot more limited than before. Peter Gallagher, Associate Director of IT Help Desk Services, explained, “The values we’re using were data-driven decisions based on 10 years of historical usage collected by of the previous printing solution that we retired last year. We also consulted with the Student Senate before making any of these decisions as well since we greatly value student feedback and input.”

In regards to the decision to change the printer points system, Gallagher stated, “Why we switched from points to dollars was due to a change with the printing solution that we made this summer, moving from a product called P-points to Papercut. The old product that we used had announced that it was discontinuing some of the core services that we leveraged, and they didn’t provide an option for a replacement for those lost services. Additionally, we faced some issues that were caused by the technical limitations inherited in its design. For example, the Student Senate voiced some concerns about the dynamic printing volume between semesters and how an allotment per term was often problematic for students along with the lack of continuity between different printer point structures (color vs art, etc.). We initially wanted a direct replacement but unfortunately no competitors used a points structure and instead favored dollars, so we had to transition the allocation from points to dollars. This product also allowed us to change the allotment process from a term-based solution to a overall career allocation.”

92% of students polled on Instagram think that 50 dollars is not enough for a student’s printing needs throughout the four years. Certain programs’ professors require daily printed work, such as the Education Program. Some programs even require pages printed in color. Jessica Vasquez, who is in her final semester of student teaching, commented, “I know that a lot of professors have mock lessons before final clinical practice where they require students to print out enough materials for an entire class, plus the professor. And a lot of times EDUC students may not have access to print at their placements because we can’t have our personal devices. We use Stockton printing services a lot!” One student didn’t even know about the printing system until they saw the poll on Instagram, and expressed that they had already printed a lot of files at the Lodge, thinking that we still had the 1600 printer points. Another student in the Business program expressed, “50 dollars doesn’t help us for two years, let alone four years. It’s not fair that we have to pay more money for printing when we already pay enough for tuition, books, etc. It’s ridiculous.”

Gallagher informed, “We did a historical analysis of all printing over the last 10 years of lab printer usage, which included the printing history for about 35k students who have come through Stockton during that time. What we found was that on average most students printed about $12 dollars throughout their entire academic career (4 years). Less than 2% of students over the last 10 years have printed more than $50 dollars through an academic career. For those that had printed more than $50 dollars, they printed a lot more than 50 dollars, and often into the hundreds. The goal for us was to pick an amount that the majority of students wouldn’t surpass based on historical data but something that was reasonable as we want to be conscious on the potential environmental impact that printing causes. That figured ended up being the just shy of $50 so we rounded it up to an even number, which is how we ended up with the current default allocation.”

While this is a welcome relief for most students, the minority of students who use over $50 in printing need resources they can use if they do go over the amount and can’t be paying out of pocket. Education majors should definitely have a resource where they can print for free or at least a reduced cost. The new system is also stressful for graduate students. One student in a Masters’ program pointed out: “I have noticed that in some classes, we are required to have everything printed out. This includes PowerPoints and readings that are utilized during class, that way we are prepared for active class participation. It’s not right that our tuition does not include resetting or adding to printer points at least once a year. 50 dollars are definitely not enough for our time at Stockton.”

A senior Education student has already burned through about $6 worth of her printing funds in a month. “Printer paper costing money makes me feel more stressed out about if I will have enough,” she told me. “I only have 2 semesters left at Stockton and am already down to roughly $42. The papers that I normally would print to help me learn, I have stopped printing, which is making it harder to understand the information I receive. I do not have money to add more points onto my account. I couldn’t imagine having to have $50 for my entire time at Stockton if it was longer than 2 semesters!”

I’ve personally also found this new system a bit stressful as a low-income student. One of my courses is asynchronous, but still requires printed and handwritten work. It’s disheartening that the year I’m required to print more work, I have to calculate how many dollars I have left, and I still have two years left at Stockton. Personally, I think teachers should have the new system in mind and consider the students that are stressed about paying for printing. I had also purchased $5 worth of Color Points just last semester, and I’m not getting that money back — $5 thankfully isn’t that much at all, but for college students, every penny adds up. Another factor is club expenses. Students now have to use their organizations’ budgets to pay for printing, and for new organizations without an allocated budget, the funds come out of their pockets. As president of a new club at Stockton this year, I’ve also been trying to avoid using the printers for posters and other products needed. Fraternities and sororities do not have a school-allocated budget to cover their promotional posters, either.

However, in regards to these factors, Gallagher said, “Less than 30 students, which is less than half of a percent of the currently 8,700 students who are actively enrolled, have printed more than 10 dollars with of pages in our labs so far. Most of those that have printed more than $10 have done so by printing several hundred color pages which cost about 4 times more than black and white pages, hence the large expense. Historically B&W, Color, and Art points were different buckets that students had to choose from and were limited in their distribution. The 1600 points were for just black and white only, where students were provided with a one-time distribution of 20 color points, and art students were forced to pay out of pocket for all of their printing expenses. With this new system there are no boundaries meaning that Art students can now put this $50 balance towards their art prints. Students who want to print more than 20 pages in color can now do so without having to pay out of pocket for more color pages.”

For students seeking resources to not pay out of pocket, Gallagher reassured, “Students who experience ebbs and flows of printing needs between semesters can now budget their resources on their own and aren’t beholden to a limited number of pages in any given semester. We’re also not stuck with the $50 dollar allocation. If we find that the needs of our students have changed and we need to increase the allocation to better serve students, we can do so.”

One benefit that students have indeed noticed and agreed on is that we can see how much we’ve printed and how much we have left in printing, and we can even see it on our phones. “In the old system you couldn’t login and view your printing history so there was no way to understand what you were doing and what you had done,” said Gallagher. “This new system is completely transparent with the way it collects and stores the information. It’s also much more reliable as we would constantly receive calls from students and faculty about issues with the lab printers due to the way the old system deployed and managed devices. It also brings enhanced printer access through a mobile app that allows for easier access from personal devices: https://stockton.edu/information-technology/print-from-own-device.html.”

Gallagher did advise that “students should try to be mindful of what they’re printing and what the real-world impact of that printing looks like. Every morning, I have a team member walk the halls to refill the printers with paper around campus and a regular part of that process unfortunately includes cleaning up and recycling stacks of abandoned print jobs left at printers. So far this semester students have printed a total of 252,765 pages which equates to roughly 19 trees worth of paper and has generated a carbon footprint large enough to operate a supermarket for 16 hours.”