“Pre-carding” returning students made it easier for 14,244 U-Pass cards to be printed and picked up by the second week of the Fall 2016 semester, dramatically reducing line-ups and wait times at the beginning of the semester.
“It’s a success,” said Roch Lafond, Manager at the Parking, Lockers and Card Services.
“Considering the fact that the U-Pass was only introduced last year, we’ve done very well compared to other institutions,” he added.
Christelle Dory, a first-year student from the Development Service Worker Program said she was impressed with the Card Services for organizing the distribution of U-Pass.
“I came in early in the morning and there were just a few of us in the line waiting to pick our cards,” said Dory.
In September 2015, only 12,421 cards were issued. It went up this year by two per cent.
Within the first week of school, over 3,874 cards were printed and picked up by students.
“We hired more people because of the pre-printed cards,” said Lafond.
The main idea behind this was to try to get people out of the lines.
However, there were still a good number of students who had to wait in line for hours to get their cards printed.
The student association also sent in a few students to help with the distribution on the first day of school, in order to help mitigate students waiting in line.
The first two days were the most hectic and 1,100 cards were printed each day.
Coffee and Timbits were offered on every distribution day, to help comfort students waiting for their cards to be printed.
“We are here for them, that’s why we exist,” Lafond added.
However, a few students still haven’t picked up their cards. Whether they are not aware or don’t want it is still unclear to Card Services.
Lafond mentioned that 1,500 cards have been printed but not picked up.
There are another 111 cases from the Registrar’s Office that remain unknown whether the students left or whether they will be returning for the fall semester.
By the second week of school, Card Services had already issued 75 replacement U-Pass cards to students. Meanwhile last year a total of 1,190 cards were replaced between Sept. 2015 to April 2016.
Algonquin was also the first school to initiate summer passes for its full-time students over the summer.
“There are more initiatives coming up,” said Lafond, to get the student cards joint with the U-pass.
The one card initiative is in the process as the college together with Carleton University, Ottawa University, STO, and OC Transpo is looking forward to having a smart card.
This means that the change of color on yearly U-passes will be irrelevant and students will have to tap their cards while boarding the bus just like the Presto cards.
“We always think about the students and how we can reduce the stress and pressure on students,” said Lafond.