Our Voice

GCSU boasts an extraordinary amount of student services. Problem is, most of them are ineffectual at best, and plain out worthless at worst.
Take for instance Student Health Services. There is a running joke among the students that if you went to health services with your leg cut off, you would leave with a bottle of Guaifenex and pat on the head. It is a place that students go to only as a last resort, only when they truly feel they cannot take the pain or suffering anymore.
And what do they get when they go?
They are treated to a 45-minute wait, a package of Ibuprofen, a mini-baggy of Halls cough drops and some vague guess at a diagnosis.
So what is the solution?
How about GCSU fork over the money and hire a real doctor for the students, a professional who can prescribe a stronger medicine than magic mouth wash?
After that they can move on to SERVE, the place of great mystery and wonderment to all of campus. We all know they are there somewhere in the background, but none of us really know what they do and why they do it. Most students and faculty alike could not even tell you in what building their office is located. To be honest, if they did their job, we wouldn’t care where they are or what they are doing.
But, unfortunately, we must care.
We have to because it is a major inconvenience when myCATS does not work. It’s a pain when the system crashes and you are trying to register for classes. Or, in our specific case, it’s no very fun when half the computers in your office crash and the only SERVE expert on campus who can fix Macs is out of town.
Now, we do realize that the SERVE department is understaffed and that they do the best they can. So why doesn’t the University take some of that money dedicated to creating more green space and hire a few more technicians? We can guarantee students will not mind the sight of their cars in a parking lot while their e-mails are sent and received with no problems.
In a more specific instance of the system failing, students who went to the Wellness Depot this past Tuesday were probably surprised to find that after their hard, sweaty work out, there was no water for them to drink. That’s right, the school gym decided they needed to cut the water off while people were still working out. They couldn’t be bothered to provide a cooler of water or free water bottles. Nope, instead they just put a sign up above the fountains saying they were “sorry for the inconvenience.” Have they ever heard of dehydration? Isn’t it a little dangerous?
But I guess if anyone had actually gotten sick, the nonexistent personal trainers could have rushed the ill person over to health services for a bottle of Guaifenex.

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Posted by Colonnade Archives on Mar 16 2007. Filed under Opinion, Our Voice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry