Week 9 - In Class

Today we had our presentations. For this post I wanted to discuss what I said in my presentation. I chose to observe the second floor computer lab because it receives the most foot traffic due to its addition of a print lab. Although I am a lab tech I wanted to go into my observation with an open mind and determine the problems from there.

I found three problems in my observation:
1) Print vouchers; Students were unable to purchase a print voucher over the weekend so if they did not by Friday they were unable to print over the weekend.
2) Too many people in the lab expecting to print at the same time. It causes a pile up and people at the end of the line are sometimes not able to complete their prints.
3) The 30 minute rule; this is put in place so students do not come in expecting to print 30 minutes before their class. It is just out of respect for the lab tech and the professor of the next class.

To come to these observations I observed three blocks during the week and during the weekend. Initially I thought that there would be a difference in the number of prints that were done during the week and weekend but they proved to be similar. The thing that surprised me was the common hours that students came in to print which was consistent between the weekday and weekend.
Weekend:
Not an issue
Weekday:
Issue because the lab is open in between classes, Especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays where it is open during common hours and only for a hour and 15 minutes.

Methods:
Real time conversation: had with students and asked them why they had come to print during common hours (were unaware, had class or didn't want to get out of bed for morning hours).
Cognitive walkthrough: Printed during the weekday and weekend. No issues with either but found if I had printed a minute later for the weekday I would not have been able to print.
Survey:
How long does it take to print?
Student: about 5 minutes to print
Lab tech: about 10-15 minutes
Do you know the different paper types?
Student: maybe
What could the lab do better?
Have print vouchers all week long and have time slots for printing.

Suggestions:
New variation of print voucher: similar to swiping like marauder gold
Time slots for printing: student could think about if they have the project on their flashdrive and what paper they want to use. Allow the lab tech to prepare the lab as well before a student comes in.
Enforce and respect the 30 minute rule