IIT Newsletter -- May 2005
Student Computing Survey (cont.)

The annual IIT student survey on student ownership and use of computers took place during registration in November. Most students participate in the survey and provide us with valuable data and feedback.

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As we predicted last year laptop ownership has now taken the lead in computing ownership, with 52% of the students indicating that they owned a laptop. The first year class upped these statistics as 65% of the class brought a laptop to campus compared to 42% of the seniors.

One interesting change involves Macintosh computer ownership. For the first time in many years the number of students with Macintoshes is on the rise. Many other schools are reporting similar statistics. 20% of our first year students brought a Mac to campus; the overall Macintosh ownership stands at 17% of the computer owners. While we can only speculate on the reasons, it's possible that the virus prone Windows operating system and the wild success of Apple's iPod has driven students to consider the Macintosh for their computing needs. Four percent of St. Olaf students brought two computers with them to campus.

During the summer of 2004, IIT installed the first phase of the campus wireless network, so it made sense to query the students on their use of this new resource. 25% of the students reported that they had used the wireless network. As one might expect with the high percentage of laptop ownership, the first-year students lead the way with 34% reporting that they used the wireless network.

While ownership is up, the majority of students still report that they rely on the St. Olaf-provided computing labs. Eighty-four percent of the students indicated that they use the St. Olaf computing labs. While this percentage has fluctuated some from year to year the number has remained consistently high.

The residential hall computing labs remain the top computing spot for students with 70% of the students reporting that they use these facilities. The general computing labs in the academic buildings are the second most used facilities with 56%.

Last year we implemented a charge system for public printers. Each student received 400 pages of free printouts; after those free pages were consumed, the student was charged. In 2003-04, 48% of the students brought a printer with them to campus and 69% reported that they used the St. Olaf provided printers. This year printer ownership is up to 60%; use of the public printers, however, has not declined.

Perhaps the most useful information we gather from the students is their comments about the services we provide. We invite students to provide their general comments about our services and facilities and this year 777 students did just that. We read through each and every comments and attempt to find patterns and similarities. If students provide us with their name or e-mail address, we do get back to them. The comments range widely from very positive to the unprintable. Each year we develop the Top Ten Issues list and, for the 3 rd year in a row, positive feedback took the top spot.

These top ten issues are identical to last year except some issues have significantly moved up or down in priority. One issue that has moved up significantly on the list is the request from students for more help from IIT. Their comments ranged from requests for more assistance from the professional staff to requests for quicker turn around on their calls, to requests for staff to schedule more appointments in the residence halls. First-year and junior students ranked this as their top issue. This same type of request has also been noted in the recent faculty/staff survey. IIT will have to be creative in looking at new ways to increase the level of direct support we provide the community if we are to remain with our existing level of staffing. We employ a large student staff, but often the issues the students need help with are beyond the expertise and available time we can get from our more experienced students employees.

The speed of our Internet connection has remained in the Top Ten for the past four years, moving from 1st , to 4th , to 6th to back up to 2nd. This was the top issue for the seniors, 2nd for the sophomores and third for the first-years and juniors.

Requests for more wireless access is also moving up in the ranks. Three years ago this issue didn't make the Top Ten list. Last year it ranked 8 th and now has moved into the 4 th slot. Wireless networking is undoubtedly going to remain a Top Ten issue for a number of years, particularly as the number of students with laptops increases.

IIT staff members use the annual survey data to help guide us in our planning decisions for the upcoming year. For example, in years past the students have noted that they wanted more help connecting their computers to the network at the beginning of the academic year. We made significant changes in how we staffed the Helpdesk during the first few weeks of the academic year and this has resulted in a significant reduction in the number of complaints. While we surely can't resolve all issues and complaints we do take an in-depth look at everything to see what is possible.

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