Monday, April 16, 2007

Virginia on my mind

Students killed

My Opinion: We need to do what we can to reduce stress and tension
I don't think we do enough to reduce stress at SJSU and tension is often unnecessarily high on our campus. A campus does not have to be as tense as ours is. With a little effort we could make it much more pleasant and less stressful for students to get an education at SJSU. It seems to me that reducing student frustration, stress and anxiety is not a high enough priority on our campus.

For example:

  • I believe the hassles students have to go through to get enrolled at SJSU are incredible and inexcusable.
  • When students at SJSU have problems it is not clear to students where to go to get their problems resolved. Getting solutions at our campus can be like navigating a maze of disconnected groups that do not talk to each other. For example, today students at SJSU had to pay fees. Many of them created tickets in our "Help Desk" ticketing system asking to get their fee paying issues resolved. Since the university does not have one ticketing system for the entire campus the only resolution we could give our students was to point them in the direction of another help desk who we thought could help them.
  • In our computer lab in Clark Hall there is a print station. You have to pay for prints when you use the computers with a card that you have to add value to. But, there is no place in the lab to add money to the card. Try telling that to a student who is in a rush to print a paper before a class.

At the time I am writing this I do not know what set this guy off in Virginia
But, in my heart, I think there is a lot we could be doing to reduce stress at SJSU. It may cost a little bit to fix these stress points. But, it is worth the cost. Life is so short, and so precious.

No comments: