One Cards to be distributed

Campus Dining Service has inadvertantly been serving up guilt and a decline in town dining revenue in the turmoil and confusion encircling the ever-forthcoming new validines.

Returning students were notified in the middle of the summer that their validines would be replaced by a new, multi-purpose "One Card" from AT&T.

In addition to allowing students to enter dining and residential halls, the card will eventually be coded for use in copy, laundry and vending machines on a cash-deductible basis.

The arrival of the new coded cards may well be appreciated by some businesses in Oberlin. One business owner who wished to remain anonymous has noticed a decline of 20-30 percent in business from students and said that the validine problem could be a cause, since any students can get a free meal with their blank temporary card. "We are still doing okay," the business owner said.

Another business owner stated that although sales are down, "it's too early to tell what the cause is."

Students have mixed feelings about using their blank cards to eat more than their allotted share of dining hall meals.

One junior co-op member said, "I feel a passing guilt, but it doesn't keep me from going; I pay so much for the College. . . They did it to themselves by not giving us an ID with a picture on it - they opened the door; they gave us the privilege."

Other students showed mixed reactions. "It's wrong; it's stealing and it's not really free," said one fifth-year co-oper.

One senior said he avoids the dining halls, not for any moral reason but because he is repulsed by the dining hall food.

Assistant Director of Residential Life and Services/Business Michele Gross added that the College is not experiencing major financial problems due to students taking advantage of the blank cards, but asks people to be honest.

The original plan was to distribute temporary picture ID's to every student during enrollment. These temporary ID cards took roughly two minutes to print, but only one camera was in operation during enrollment. This problem caused considerable difficulties in getting everyone's picture taken and printed in an efficient manner.

Each co-oper or off-board student could have been given a separately-coded card from those distributed to on-board students in order to prevent co-opers from eating more than the permitted one meal a week in the dining halls.

Gross said, "We didn't want to hassle people by figuring out who was in which category."

To ease the frustration of waiting in long lines, the Residential Life and Services department gave returning students blank cards and told them to come back later to get their pictures taken for the permanent IDs.

"The fastest and most efficient way was to hand out blank temps so students wouldn't have to wait," Gross said. "This didn't seem to be a problem at the time, because the permanent cards with 'Oberlin' printed in red and gold across the top were to be distributed right after enrollment."

Temporary picture ID cards were not given to every student after enrollment because of the cost of putting the picture on a piece of plastic, as well as a shortage of time staff members had to devote to the task.

Continuous computer glitches have slowed the process of preparing permanent cards. The entire process was originally scheduled to take only three weeks.

According to Michele Gross, the United Parcel Service (UPS) strike greatly affected the whole process. The computer required for making IDs arrived only the day before enrollment, resulting in little time for setting-up, trouble-shooting or training.

"Time was really short; ideally, you would get [the computers] a few days in advance so that you can work out problems," Gross said.

The late arrival of the permanent cards due to orders from other schools in addition to Oberlin, compounded by a few more glitches in printing, resulted in even more delays. Gross hopes the permanent cards will be distributed next week though Residential Life and Services is still waiting for a call from AT&T to iron out printing and other problems.

Losing business: Java Zone, one of many restaurants affected by One Cards. (photo by Leslie Torre)