By Lauren Ferguson
For about the twelfth time today my wireless Internet refuses to connect.
“ULSECURE connection has been cancelled,” my computer informs me. This is something that has become a daily routine. Again, I attempt to connect to the Internet. (I get connected) after ten minutes of waiting and screaming countless words of profanity. In reality, this just adds to the list of things that I have gotten for my tuition money at U of L: a bunch of things that don’t work so well.
If the university is requiring students to pay so much money for tuition, shouldn’t working wireless be a part of the package?
Today, society has become so dependent on technology that a world without Internet is almost impossible to live in. Not only do students use it as a way to connect socially with their peers, they use it for school work as well. I assumed that an easy access Internet wireless service would be no problem on a college campus.
“U of L Wireless is a secure network that encrypts traffic on the network to prevent intrusions and interception of traffic,” U of L’s Web site claims. Obviously the ones in charge of the wireless have never used it, or else they would see the interceptions that occur in just a single day. Many students have reported problems with U of L’s wireless and Internet, especially at the beginning of the semester.
The problem seems to have gone unfixed. Apparently U of L doesn’t see this as a problem. In the long list of issues that people have with the school solving wireless problems are not something of top priority to them.
Yet, teachers still post notes, homework, lectures, and tests on Blackboard, expecting students to be able to access the information easily.
If students have a wireless connection that is simply useless, they are unable to complete their school work. Until the day comes when the wireless connection works properly on a regular basis, I’ll be sitting here, in my over-heated dorm room, waiting. Waiting for the day where I can stop using numerous words of profanity on a piece of technology that can’t respond.
