Library printing alternative will save money and time

By Alex White
Staff Writer

Since the start of the school year, students have had no access to library printers. However, a new school plan will streamline the printing system and eliminates the waste of school resources and student time. This plan, named the “pilot project,” has been implemented and involves students emailing documents to the copy room. Documents will be printed and picked up either before school or at lunch.

This system is the most efficient way to allow all students to receive hard copies of the documents they need because the old library printers were not designed for high volume printing, and supplies such as toner and paper were limited.

Until this year, students used the library as their only source to print documents at school. As time went on, demand for printing exceeded the capacity for the library printers, according to Principal Ben Dale. Mira Costa librarian Jane Lofton then spent much of her time trying to fix machines, instead of performing her other duties.

While it may upset many of the students who frequently use the library to do their printing, shutting down the system was the only logical step that could have been taken. It was a waste of time, money and supplies that Mira Costa could not afford.

Mira Costa’s new plan will be supervised by a full-time employee who is trained for the job and has complete access to much faster copiers and printers than the library does.

This will save time and materials for the school. Also, since students simply have to email their documents in, students will save time as well. Students will no longer have to spend time turning on a library computer only to find out that the printer is jammed, wasting time and effort.

The only major downside to the pilot project is the introduction of a 10-cent fee per side to print. This may seem like a large problem the pilot program is creating, but this change was inevitable anyway, as Dale said the school couldn’t afford free printing, even if it was intended for school assignments.

While no exact figures on the library specifically are available, Manhattan Beach Unified School District data shows that projections for the cost of supplies was greatly underestimated in the creation of last year’s budget, and this may be one cause.

Furthermore, some students have taken issue with the fact that documents must be submitted before school or before lunch in order to be printed.

While this may be one fault in the system, the easy accessibility of the pilot project outweighs this somewhat minor fallback. Without additional funds, this is the best system available to the student body.

A group of students has tried to replace the printers in the library, and its efforts are well-intentioned. However, its other suggestions to the pilot program are simply unfeasible. Buying printers that can properly handle that kind of workload would cost significantly more than any aspect of the pilot program, seeing as a single copier in the copy room can costs thousands.

There is no way to have efficient printing at that large a scale in the library with current resources, and the copy room is made to handle these kinds of jobs.

Because of the nature of the printing that students do at Mira Costa, this system is the most efficient way to allow students to get their documents printed. Students will now have access to more reliable technology with this plan in effect. Mira Costa will finally have a way to print out hard copies, without the hassle of the old library printers.