I’m having my students print an essay in the computer lab. I’ve scheduled the lab two weeks in advance because it is harder to get into than Studio 54 in the seventies.
My students need this time, because most of them have had very little experience using word-processing software and their experience in this class is invaluable.
The printer runs out of paper, so I ask the lab tech for some more paper. She tells me curtly that she does not have any. I then run up to my room and take out my personal supply of paper so my students can get their work printed.
After lunch, I receive this heart-warming email.
“TEACHERS,
IF YOU ARE HAVING YOUR CLASS PRINT, PLEASE PROVIDE PAPER. I APOLOGIZE BUT WE DO NOT KEEP PAPER STOCKED IN LABS.
EACH TEACHER IS RESPONSIBLE FOR PROVIDING THEIR OWN PAPER FOR THEIR CLASS. SORRY!!”
Thanks. I will make sure to provide my own paper to the lab even though the school gets 4 million in funding. Thanks for all the help.
p.s. Can we chill on the all-caps? That is stressing me out.
I’m really not amazed by the ineptitude of bureaucracies–how careless they are with resources especially when the resources were not produced by them. Those resources include not only paper but numerous other priceless commodities including fuel, time, and blood. Though the bureaucracies indeed have a stake in it all, they don’t feel the pain and care of ownership–they have no vision for efficiency. So why do we continue to so empower them?
Seriously! I’m getting the feeling that they wouldn’t have written that email if you wouldn’t have been in the lab that day?!
My pet peeve is people printing things that don’t need printed, probably in other school districts and nearby offices. If only they’d be willing to donate some of that paper. It’s just gonna sit in another pile & be ignored for years, anyway!