"When classes start Sept. 6 at the University of California at Merced, the campus will be packed with so much technology, students will be able to monitor their laundry via the Internet. The campus is wired with countless miles of computer cable, blanketed with wireless networks and chock full of other technology, said Richard Kogut, chief information officer for the college’s information technology department.
The moment students register, they will be handed some technology – a radio frequency identification (RFID) chip – in their identification cards, Kogut said. The cards are called ‘cat cards’ after the campus mascot, the Bobcat.
Student debit accounts can be established on campus and linked to the cards, Kogut said. The cost of services and materials will be debited from those accounts, he said. They’ll even work in campus vending machines.
‘With the cat cards, you can quickly slide library books through a scanner with your card on top and it will automatically record what books you are checking out,’ Kogut said. ‘The cat cards also can be used to do your laundry.’
Using the cat card in the laundry room also will connect the student’s washer or dryer to the Internet.
‘Students will be able to check when the washers or driers are finished with their cycles over the Internet,’ Kogut said. ‘They can go back to their rooms to study and keep on eye on the laundry at the same time. They also will be alerted if the door to a washing machine or drier was opened.’
Cat cards will serve as identification at the financial aid office, the employment center and other campus facilities.
If a card is lost or stolen, the student can quickly invalidate it and get a new one. The RFID chips don’t have any student information on them, only a key, or coded personal identification number.
Chips also are being put in library books, said Bruce Miller, university librarian, and will help keep track of the volumes if they are lost.
‘We can also see what books are being checked out,’ he said. If a book isn’t used for several years, it will go into storage, Miller said, but if it’s needed, it can be returned to the shelves within a day.
The Leo Kolligian Library is networked with other UC campuses, so books at other libraries in the system can be delivered to a student in two to three days, he said.
‘Because of that access to other libraries, our library system is second only to The Library of Congress in terms of what we have access to,’ Miller said. ‘Books in Berkeley, Irvine, San Diego or any other UC, those are ours, too.’
And access is what all the technology is about.
Students and staff members won’t have trouble getting to the Internet or the school’s network, Kogut said.
Thousands of computer ethernet ports around campus will allow students to plug computers into the network, and the campus also will be blanketed by wireless coverage, he said."
Bee staff writer Patrick Giblin can be reached at 578-2347 or pgiblin@modbee.com.
For additional information:
http://www.modbee.com/reports/ucmerced/story/11151728p-11904647c.html