Printing will no longer be free.

Students printing at the Jacobs Library, Learning Commons or the Ottawa Center Open Lab will be charged 5 cents for black-and-white and 25 cents for color. Additionally, the price of copies will be reduced from 10 to 5 cents. Printing will remain free in instructional labs.

The Board of Trustees officially approved on Feb. 19 an Audit-Finance Committee’s recommendation to implement printing fees . The college already charged for copies and will now charge for printouts.

Jerry Corcoran, IVCC President, noted that the college spends approximately $15,000/year on printing costs and that in the 2012 fall semester, students made approximately 220,000 printouts. The Information Technology Committee noted that a charge-per-print system would help eliminate wasteful printing. The minutes of the Audit-Finance Committee noted that Student Trustee Britney Burkart and the Student Government Association “supported charging students for printing.”

To implement this system, the Board of Trustees also approved the $13,762 purchase of three coin/bill machines, one scan station, software licenses, installation and maintenance.

The estimated revenue in the first year is $17,000, which will offset printing costs.

These fees will start in the summer semester.