The Senate of College Councils passed a resolution on Oct. 30 proposing a UT Libraries printing credit for each semester delivered directly to students’ existing UT Print accounts.
Through UT Libraries, students can access printing, copying and scanning services through UT Print. According to the resolution, the current rates for standard printing are 11 cents per one-sided black-and-white page and 30 cents per color page. Currently, the printing credit value has not been set by the University, but the resolution states it should be sufficient to cover at least 50 black-and-white pages as a baseline amount based on other universities.
Aran Belani, a co-author of the resolution, said UT is one of the only major universities in Texas that does not provide printing credits to its students. Belani, a public health junior, said Texas A&M University, the University of Houston and other UT System universities all provide printing credits.
“We hope that (this resolution) will give the office of the CIO, CFO and the provost some motivation and knowledge that students do want this printing credit,” Belani said.
Chris Carter, director of organizational effectiveness for UT Libraries, wrote in a statement that UT Print fees cover the cost of providing the service to students. He wrote that while it is not within the UT Libraries budget, they welcome conversations about providing printing credits to students.
“The goal of making this printing credit is to promote equity, support first-(generation) students, support Pell Grant eligible students and align with UT students’ success priorities,” Belani said. “Making success available for everyone without any additional burden of cost is our main goal with this.”
However, the Student Government has already tried implementing a similar bill. Leander D’Costa, a University-wide representative in SG, said he co-authored a free-printing bill that was passed earlier this year. D’Costa, an international relations and global studies senior, said that at the time, his goal was to make printing accessible and affordable and make UT keep up with other universities. However, the bill has not gone into effect yet as the University is figuring out how to implement a credit.
“It’s no surprise,” D’Costa said. “That’s just because with UT, there’s obviously a lot of processes … and things just take time. We were aware of this going into it, but at the same time, we were glad that UT actually considered this initiative and was taking it seriously.”
D’Costa said the SG bill was mainly limited because of the funding and logistics behind creating a printing credit. He said he is glad that the Senate resolution has University support.
Belani said Cole Camplese, vice president for technology and chief information officer first introduced the idea to the senate to reduce the University’s many printing contracts to less, then use those savings to fund the student printing credit.
“It really gave us encouragement that we have the support and the backing of the administration,” Belani said. “We know that we’re not just doing this to send a message.”
Editor’s Note: This article has been updated to better reflect the Senate’s resolution. The Texan regrets this error.
