Online disservice: How accommodating is our campus computer network?

By Cheri Morton
Staff Writer

OK, let’s say you have an online class. You sit down at your computer, pull up the website, and go to Blackboard to get your assignments. Only Blackboard doesn’t come up. You can’t get your assignments. Or, during registration, Braveweb is down. You can’t get the classes you need because by the time you are finally able to get onto Braveweb, the classes have been filled.

Our online service is supposed to make our lives easier. The problem is that sometimes – especially during busy web usage – servers go down. That’s not making our lives easier; it’s making our lives more complicated.

If this happens every year, wouldn’t it be more efficient to go back to the old way of registering, meeting directly with advisors? Or, when you get on Braveweb and the screen often comes up “login expired” or “server unavailable,” why not go back to mailing us our grades? (How does login time expire when you have not been on the page more than 20 seconds?)

Another inconvenience is if students don’t own a computer, they must register with the computer club in order to be get online anywhere on campus. This means students have to take time out of already hectic schedules to find the computer lab and set up an account. If you don’t do it, you can’t do anything online. Some new students – whether they are freshmen or transfers – don’t even realize they have to get their computers registered. I say, if you register to attend UNC Pembroke, you should be registered for network services then. Why not provide a temporary password in the envelope with room keys, a password that they could then use to access the network and then change on their own? It would make it more convenient for students to set up accounts, which, in turn, would make it easier for teachers to get students’ email addresses on the first day of classes.

Realistically, I believe students should need passwords for only two functions: to get our grades and to access our financial aid accounts. Why do we need passwords to surf the web? And what happens when a whole area of computers can’t access the network? Students can’t get assignments off Blackboard or important email from teachers. For that matter, even if students don’t require actual online access—say, writing a Word document or using Photoshop—they are still often blocked from doing work because they are unable to log their individual computer onto the network.

Our university network service should be redesigned to be less confusing and more usable. Services need to be regrouped and re-categorized to make searches easier, and equipment desperately needs to be upgraded.