Shortened library hours and lab closure limits students' resources

By Rachel Manuel

Slideshow on the College of Education's limited resources

At the start of the Fall semester, the library of The University of Hawaii at Manoa's College of Education has been having trouble staying open due to a shortage of student help. The Curriculum Resource Center, or CRC for short, inside Wist Hall is closed all morning for three days a week and on some days does not open until 2 p.m. The computer lab, located inside, remains closed for servicing until further notice. CRC supervisor Cari Yanaga said the difficulty of keeping the library open started in summer, following the loss of two workers. She says normally the CRC is operated by four students. Currently, there are three workers.The tentative hours at the CRC have posed problems for students and faculty members.

CRC's limited hours affecting many

The CRC's tentative hours have created problems for people at the College of Education. A student sits outside the CRC during its closed mornings hours and works on her laptop.

Yanaga has found it difficult to find applicants available to work in the mornings. Several students who applied were free only during weekends, during which the CRC is closed. Yanaga said one student who had been scheduled to work had told her the day before the semester began that he accepted another job. Another student also declined to work at the last minute after being hired.

Cecily Ornelles, an assistant professor within the Special Education department, says she encountered a problem when trying to rent equipment loaned out through the CRC. When she came in the first day of classes to borrow something, she found the CRC closed.

Graduate Assistant Mark Cook of the Technology and Distance programs oversees the loaner pool of the CRC's equipment. He had been receiving e-mails from people looking to borrow equipment and asking when the CRC would be open, though he does not work in the CRC. Cook says, "I try to do my best to be available to provide the resources that students or faculty need when it's closed…There have been times where I've scheduled to do something, maybe I'm across campus or off campus, and I've had to come up and schedule times to meet with people and get them equipment," he says.

Lee Anna Kobayashi, a graduate student of the Special Education department, says she hopes to use the CRC to study, but because of its hours, it will be difficult for her to use the library as often as she would like. She says, "It's inconvenient that it's not open all day, every day, because then we (the students) can't use the resources." Kobayashi goes to Sinclair library instead. However, "It'll be difficult because a majority of my classes are here (in Wist Hall)," she says. "If I have to use a different library, then I'll have to go back and forth. It's a big waste of time.

A bookcase blocks off the computer lab inside the College of Education's library. The lab was closed in the summer, until further notice.

CRC's Mo'o lab still closed since the summer

The unavailability of the CRC's Mo'o lab has also created problems for students looking to use it. Many students enter the CRC and head towards the lab only to find it shut down until further notice. Senior Carlos Tome of Secondary Education went to the lab twice, but found it closed. He says, "I don't have internet access at home and for a lot of my assignments, they are online, like WebCT."

Junior Shannon Lee, majoring in Elementary Education, had to go to Sinclair library to print out some documents. While students are granted a print quota and can supply their own ream of paper at the Mo'o lab, students must pay to print at other libraries on campus. Lee, who spent about $9, says printing at Sinclair library is expensive. Lee says, "Because our classes are right here (in Wist Hall), we can just run in, print out our papers then run back to class." She adds that though she had to wait about 20 minutes for a computer at Sinclair, it was not a lot of trouble for her. "I'd like the lab to be open, but I understand they want to work all the kinks out first," Lee says. 
           
The lab provides students within the COE access to computers. It was officially closed in the summer to replace all the hardware. Informational Technology specialist Chris Stark says, "The systems were so obsolete that they weren't worth repairing." There are now ten new machines in the lab, which are all Macs but could run both Mac and Windows operating systems. Stark says, "The end result is a more functional lab that is more useful, up-to-date and faster." He says hopefully the lab will be up by the middle of the week, but one to two pieces of software still need to be added.