By Karlie Baker
IV Leader Editor, Sept. 13, 2007
Social networking sites allow students to meet and keep in touch with
friends through e-mail and message boards, join groups with common interests, and stay updated culturally.
Facebook and Myspace boast 34 and 106 million accounts, respectively, so it comes as no surprise that these sites are a student favorite.
However, these sites created a number of problems for students and IT administrators.
According to Chris Dunlap, associate director of network systems, so many students were logged onto computers for social networking purposes that students who needed to do school work were often left without the proper resources. Internet speed also became an issue. These sites tend to run a high bandwidth, which slowed down the campus’ network, Dunlap said.
In response to these problems, IT blocked student access to the more popular social networks, Facebook and Myspace.
Students were faced with few options —namely, waiting to access these sites until they got home or finding a proxy that would allow them on-campus access.
This year, Dunlap and fellow IT employees wanted to find “a happy medium” for students wishing to access these sites. This summer the school upgraded its Internet speed to a higher connection, eliminating any issues of bandwidth.
The addition of wi-fi to parts of campus allows students who bring in their own computers to access all web sites while freeing up lab computers for other students.
Because the device used to control blocked sites is picky, rooms with both wi-fi and the campus network have full accessing capabilities. Dunlap said that IT still has not decided whether this change will be permanent.
“We don’t want there to be an issue of social networking versus homework,” he said, “because sometimes they are one in the same.”
IVCC student Derek Casey now uses social networking when he is in a pinch.
“What I do is add a bunch of people from school, in case I need help from them,” he explains. “I did get a calculator after posting a bulletin, so that’s good.”
Other students find this a positive change in less conventional ways.
“Oh, I’m very pleased about students regaining access,” said Jodie Rhine, who does not belong to any social networking sites, “because I no longer have to hear people complain about how they can’t log onto Myspace.”
“I don’t think I would be able to live without being able to access Bert Reynolds’s Myspace on the go,” said Colton Ristau.