Too much printing for notes, homeworks, handouts..

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iluvassdeeanne

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Last semester wasn't that bad because most classes had me write notes, homework questions, and handouts by ourselves on scrap pieces of paper.
But sadly all my courses this semester have notes, homeworks, handouts, virtually everything posted on course websites, which means I need to print them daily and weekly. The estimated number of pages I need to print every week is over 40!!!!!!! This is even after multiple slides are printed in a single page.

Is there a way to print them for free?
 
when you get a computer account at my school you get free printing. maybe try getting all the students to sign a petition saying you spend too much money on printing and they will try to negotiate something.
 
My university is large enough that they charge you to print pages at their computer terminals as well. I highly doubt a petition would go anywhere.

Do you have a laptop you could carry around instead of printing the notes or other handouts?

Alternatively, always print double sided and even 2 sides on 1 page if the text/notes will still be readable. In essence you can fit 4 pages on 1 that way.

Or if you have a job with access to computer and printer, print your notes there 😉
 
get a job and print everything at ur work. Thats wut i am doing😀
 
I'm working at a lab and it has a printer. But previously the lab manager told me not to print anything other than what's related to lab work. I'm toast if they find out that I'm printing course material.
 
I'm working at a lab and it has a printer. But previously the lab manager told me not to print anything other than what's related to lab work. I'm toast if they find out that I'm printing course material.

Well free printing is not worth the possibility you'll get fired. Looks like you might have to suck it up and pay for the printing. I know it's a lot but isn't your education priceless? 😀

Maybe you should figure out how much you'll spend on printing this year (40 pages x 10 cents = $4 a week). Then figure out how much it'd cost you to buy a cheap printer and cartridges. If that costs too much then maybe you should offer to split the cost of cartridges/paper with a friend who has a printer.

Also, this may be better suited for another forum.
 
my school used to give eveyrone a budget of X amount of money for pritning for the year......last year they changed it so that now its free!!! I was pumped.
 
could you go paperless?

i just started med school and have been inundated with online handouts and powerpoints. now, i just take notes on the powerpoints and do all my studying directly from those.

do you have a laptop? or might you think about getting one?

being burdened by that much paper sucks. i'm glad i went to the laptop.
 
3 of my 5 classes last year were powerpoint heavy so it was very convenient to carry my small laptop instead of printing them out. This was especially true for Orgo 1 in which the slides were dynamic and when printed out made hardly any sense.

I'd recommend a cheap light laptop. I bought the IMB/Lenovo X40 for ~400 on ebay and it's a lifesaver. Also it ways ~3lbs (~2.2lbs if you forgo an extended life battery). Another option would be the ultraportable EEE pc.
 
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This is how most of my classes have been for all the time I've been at this particular university. I think I went through 3 packages of paper and 2-3 black cartridges last semester alone. I feel your pain.
 
Remember to back up those notes, powerpoints, etc. that you store on your laptop. You don't want to wind up in a situation where you lose most of your vital information right when you most need it.
 
Some med schools will charge you for the course syllabus/notes that they have...which means that you'll be paying for quite literally hundreds of pages of printouts. Double sided hundreds of pages.

Just fyi. Having to print anything is a pain...maybe you could just save the stuff on your laptop and go paperless? That way you could print the bare minimum of only what you absolutely have to.
 
I second the b/w laser printer option, I printed maybe 100-200 pages per week last semster and have a HP laserjet printer, preforms great and I needed to change the toner just once, it lasts about 2000 pages.
 
I never printed much stuff in school even though we had free printing. However, comments like
The estimated number of pages I need to print every week is over 40!!!!!!!
will evaporate quickly come med school. You'll be printing well more than that every day if your school doesn't provide you with printed copies of your lectures' powerpoint slides (like UAMS does! 😀).
 
As an aside, the number 1 most underrated med school criteria is free printing.

Absolutely. The thought never even crossed my mind before I got here but we've got free printing and it's fantastic.
 
Unless you absolutely must have a physical copy, avoid printing notes. I just consider it wasteful, since it's paper that you're likely to throw away anyway.

Med school syllabi (the huge one) on the other hand are much more useful printed because they are bound for easy storage. Unlikely to throw away, more likely to give away (or sell) to a first year. Saves the environment!
 
I have the exact same problem as you! I swear I print like 5 bajillion pages a year. I'm my own deforesting factory in my dorm room. Haha.

So I've come up with some methods.

I always print using the fast draft setting when what I'm printing is all text (pictures and diagrams usually need higher quality settings). This saves ink, because the printer deposits less ink on lower quality settings. Also, as an extra, my printer also has this setting where you can adjust how dark the ink is (how much ink is deposited - if the printout is light or dark) - these two put together make it so that I only have to buy new ink once a quarter. I wonder if printing in grey saves ink? hmmm.

Also, I print in grayscale to save ink, because black ink is cheaper. And I get my ink cartridges refilled at Walgreen's (or just refilled period) because that's cheaper too.

Other places to print:
1. Work. Like someone else said, print things at work.
2. Niches. Find the niches on campus where there is free printing. At UCLA, for example, there's this student activities center where you can print 10 pages for free (but nobody is counting), so I'll print a few pages there every once in a while.
3. Lab classes. Then, there are lab classes that I have. All labs have free printing, so I just print stuff there too. But do it when your TA isn't looking, or go to the classroom after hours and use the printer lol. Unless your TA is a grad student who is cool and won't care.
4. Lab you work for. I also print at the lab I work for, but! This is different than printing at work. Since I usually don't have stuff to print at the lab I work for, my coworkers get suspicious when suddenly I start picking up 100s of papers out of the printer. So what I do is, I sometimes work late nights or weekends when nobody else is there, so I do all my printing at once then. I'll print an entire quarter's worth of papers when nobody is looking. It's not stealing (I mean, everyone else prints, that's what printers are for), it's just a way of protecting my reputation at the lab (so that I don't become the undergrad who mooches all our ink! haha)
5. Ask around and find out where cheap printing is.

Also, to save paper, which gets expensive, print on both sides. Save bad printouts, and papers you don't use anymore (like last quarter's one-sided printouts) and use those as scratch paper to print on.

haha. :hardy:
 
Remember to back up those notes, powerpoints, etc. that you store on your laptop. You don't want to wind up in a situation where you lose most of your vital information right when you most need it.
Happened to me 2 weeks before an exam covering 6 months of material last semester. 🙁
 
4. Lab you work for. I also print at the lab I work for, but! This is different than printing at work. Since I usually don't have stuff to print at the lab I work for, my coworkers get suspicious when suddenly I start picking up 100s of papers out of the printer. So what I do is, I sometimes work late nights or weekends when nobody else is there, so I do all my printing at once then. I'll print an entire quarter's worth of papers when nobody is looking. It's not stealing (I mean, everyone else prints, that's what printers are for), it's just a way of protecting my reputation at the lab (so that I don't become the undergrad who mooches all our ink! haha)

What an awesome advice you got there. 🙂 I have a lab key so I can enter the lab anytime I want. What I'm worried about now is if the computer somehow keeps a record of all its daily and weekly printings.
 
Microsoft OneNote, save a tree
 
I either print at work...or at my research lab. Thank god for that or I would buy new ink cartridges every week!
 
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