Rose Pulido
The Signal
Reeling from budget restraints, the UHCL Alfred R. Neumann Library discontinued printing services for students this semester in efforts to reserve other academic resources provided by the library to support student success.
“We did not arrive at this decision lightly,” said Neumann Library Executive Director Karen Wielhorski. “I’ve been able to subsidize student printing, but given our budget challenges that was not as important as the resources needed for student success.”
Revenue for the library is generated from three sources: state support, library use fee (LUF) and grants, endowments and donations. Budgets were cut from two out of three resources the library depends on per semester; however, all three were equally affected.
Trickling down from state funding cut by the legislature, the cost for Texshare, a state sharing resource program, which provides UHCL students access to research databases such as Academic Search Premiere, increased.
“The state funded less than half of what it had been,” Wielhorski said. “This year our costs have gone up 49 percent.”
Fifty-seven percent of UHCL student’s LUF is appropriated to cover library salaries. Students pay $6 per semester credit hour with a cap of $60 per semester.
“Because of the budget issues we have this year, no increase in fees, no increase in new money to support us, we have cut two positions that we are no longer funding,” Wielhorski said. “We have kept positions that work directly with students.”
The lesser degree of funding for the library is provided by grants, endowments and donations. A significant 10-year grant provided by Johnson Space Center was discontinued due to budget restraints of their own.
“They have notified us that NASA has no money right now because of federal budget problems,” Wielhorski said. “Unfortunately, they have had to terminate our grant.”
The Neumann Library was not the only department forced to tighten its belt. All departments at UHCL felt the repercussions of budget cutbacks. Student Services Associate Vice President Darlene Biggers said student services and the library were not allowed to increase student fees this semester, preventing them from acquiring additional resources beyond the budget cuts.
“Unfortunately, the entire university is under budget cuts. Some of these cuts will be seen and obvious to students, but overall we are trying to cut in areas that have the least impact on students,” Biggers said.
The library is now providing an alternate solution for students to obtain their information and to help assist with their printing needs. Students can now scan books and articles for free and save them onto a flash drive or their PCLAB account. Printing is still available in any of the four computer labs on campus.
“We are all in this together,” said Student Government Association President Henry Hodde. “We are in a recession. I think printing is an issue, but because departments have to deal with budget restraints, I feel that students are going to have to learn to deal with it.”