Unlike the 2015-16 academic year, printers available to students are now only in the library, the technology offices, and  Reed. The reason? Administrative worries about students seeing tests, quizzes, and other sensitive material lying about on printers.

Some students see this as an annoyance. Julia Cavanaugh, 19′, commented on the situation, “It’s inaccessible for students who need to print for class.”

Other students, while annoyed, understand why the change was made and accept it.

“I understand the changes,” Owen King, ’17 said. “I would go into the math lab and there would be papers everywhere. You never know what kind of thing could go wrong in that kind of situation.”

Mr. Shelffo, the Chief Information Officer at Williston, explained the change.

“At the end of last year, the faculty raised this as an issue.”  Teachers worrying about test and quiz security requested that students no longer be allowed to used the printers in department offices, Shelffo added.

Shelffo cited cost concerns as well. Last academic year, Shelffo said “roughly a million pages” were printed. “That’s roughly $25,000 a year that we spend on printing,” he said. Adding printers outside of offices that are available to students would raise that cost even higher.

Mr. Shelffo said adding more printers could also cause students to print more, even further raising that expense.