Printing for the right reasons

And I will freely admit to being astoundingly obnoxious about it. I rolled my eyes, ostentatiously checked my watch, heaved great big “Oh, woe is me” sighs, traded commiserating and exasperated looks with other people who were anxiously waiting and tapped my foot in an “I am going to inflict some pain” sort of rhythm. What was interesting to me, though, is that nobody confessed to this crime. Nobody in the cluster stood up and apologized for how long it was taking or came to collect the stream of papers before they threatened to suffocate the room. And why would they? Who wants to own up to printing about 400 pages’ worth of lecture notes and readings that he or she cannot possibly get through in one sitting?

The Office of Information Technology (OIT) and the Princeton University Library have announced a quota on our printing: 2,100 sheets for undergraduates and 3,000 sheets for graduate students. Like many others, I have my doubts about how effective it will be, but I appreciate the sentiment with which it was introduced: to save the environment and to cut the University’s economic costs. But why do we really need OIT to introduce a quota to tell us we’re being ridiculous? Why are we so obsessed with printing?

I am talking strictly about printing for academic purposes here. Now, there are some printing jobs that you can’t avoid: essays, lab reports, problem set questions, poems that you wish to annotate, the like. But there are many that we can avoid — and we don’t. I’m talking about these easily avoidable jobs; I’m talking about mindless, useless, aimless printing.

I’m probably one of many students who make a “to do” list. I have a habit of putting on this list extraneous, two-minute tasks just for the sake of having things to cross off: “decide on topic for PHI paper” (notice the absence of “write PHI paper”), “make Cup Noodles for dinner” or, my personal favorite, “organize,” which is wonderfully accommodating and can include anything from sorting out the mound of paper next to my desk to the cumbersome task of throwing my empty Coke can into the trash. I frequently include “printing” in that list, just because I like giving myself an ego boost.

We feel like we’re accomplishing something momentous and exciting when we print. Just look at how long the procedure is: We get up, we put shoes on, we trek to the nearest printing cluster, we log in, we find the document, we give a print command, we go to the release computer, we print the paper, we pick it up, we come back to our room, and we feel so tremendously self-satisfied that we treat ourselves to another well-earned half-hour break after our hard labor.

Better yet is the essential confidence boost you receive when you print out the reading for a precept 10 minutes before said precept. We work ourselves up into a state of mind where having printed out the reading is immediately equivalent to having done the reading. I mean, it’s in my file, isn’t it? I’m carrying it with me, right? It doesn’t matter that I haven’t touched it and haven’t the slightest intention of doing so: I can just prominently display it on my table so that my preceptor sees it and gives me that smile that shows she knows I’ve done the reading. Or was that an encouraging smile inviting me to actually say something intelligible about the sheets that I’m so proud of?

As Princetonians, we do a lot to get through the rigors and demands of our academic life. But we need to let go of this particular coping mechanism. We shouldn’t need OIT to tell us that we’re being wasteful, careless and just plain silly. We shouldn’t require quotas to force us into good behavior. It’s simple: If you’re not going to use it, just don’t print it.

Camille Framroze is a sophomore from Bombay. She can be reached at framroze@princeton.edu.