The Student Government Association approved almost unanimously a resolution to add double-sided printing capability to campus printers at its Nov. 1 meeting.

Sophomore class senator Summer Curtiss sponsored the legislation, which aims to reduce paper waste by allowing students using university printers to print on both sides of a sheet of paper, also called duplexing. To achieve this, the school must stomach the cost of duplexers, which is why the change is not immediate.

Chris Fulkerson, assistant vice president of technology, spoke to the association in support of the initiative. He said that though he initially opposed the move to double-sided printing, the cost of duplexers has since come down to a level that is more realistic for the school’s budget.

By reducing paper use, duplex printing will decrease paper expenses, expected to fall by $2,500 a year, and waste. Both duplexers and printers have a life span of about three years, so the cost of buying new equipment means the school will ultimately break even.

Students will not save money either. So far the school plans to charge the same amount of printing dollars for four sheets of one-sided printed materials as for two sheets of double-sided.

Curtiss pointed out that while no money will be saved, duplex printing is another important step toward Elon’s goal of environmental sustainability. Beyond reducing paper waste, Curtiss said using less paper will help curtail the damage paper mills create by releasing harmful chemicals into the environment.

Currently, only printers in a few faculty offices have double-sided printing capability. Fulkerson assured SGA that the process is effective and printed materials from the offices show no sign of ink bleed-through.

Fulkerson also suggested setting duplex printing as the default option on printers with the capacity­— an idea met with overwhelming support from student government members. This decision could reduce waste even further, assuming that most students would not choose to change the setting before printing.

One student senator proposed that the school encourage professors to upload documents to Blackboard more to reduce paper waste instead of implementing duplex printing. While this idea could help, Curtiss emphasized that paper use is inevitable.

“We’ll still print off paper for something,” she said. “And as long as we are printing off paper, we might as well be duplexing as much as we can.”

In other SGA business, Russell Gill, professor of English, and Steven House, dean of the college of arts and sciences, gave a presentation on Phi Beta Kappa at the meeting. The prestigious academic honor fraternity is currently evaluating Elon to determine whether the school can establish a chapter of its own.

If Elon’s chapter is approved, the graduating class of 2010 will most likely be the first eligible for induction into the society.

Jana Lynn Patterson, assistant vice president for student life and the SGA adviser, said one of the benefits of Phi Beta Kappa is that its standards “give Elon something to shoot for to ensure academic excellence in its programs.”

Reporter: Hannah McConaghy - 11/07/07