The concept of distributing a certain amount of Illinibucks to each student would have an immense affect on how several things operate on campus. Mostly everything on campus operates on a first come first serve basis, but by allowing students to spend their Illinibucks to jump to the front of the line would change everything. It could perhaps provide more efficiency on campus as students would use their Illinibucks on the resources they use most. Students would just have to decide what they valued most to spend their Illinibucks on.
Illinibucks could be used for meetings with advisors and deans, speaking with a professor during office hours, buying food or coffee at the various cafeterias or snack shops, or meeting with someone at the career center. You could also use them for moving up in position to rent out rooms at libraries, the Ikenberry Commons, or classrooms. Additionally, although there is already a system in place for registering for classes, you could add to it by giving the option to pay in Illinibucks to move your spot up by a certain amount of days or hours depending on how much you spend. Finally, there are always extremely long lines every semester to meet with the various companies at the career fair. Perhaps the university could reach an agreement with these companies and allow students to use their Illinibucks to move up in line or hold their place in line.
It is absolutely essential though that the university sets the correct price for these various places students would spend their Illinibucks or problems will arise. If the price is too low, the university will find this project to be ineffective as everyone will use their Illinibucks for almost everything and in the end everyone will still have to wait in line. Also, with too low of prices there will be a leftover amount of Illinibucks that may be given out to friends or family giving certain students an unfair advantage of the system. On the contrary, if prices are too high students may not even use the Illinibucks as they can only be used for one or two things before their budget runs out. Plus, with excessive prices the Illinibucks may gain a monetary value, resulting in students selling theirs for money. This could result in a similar situation if certain students gain an unfair amount of the Illinibucks compared to others, and it could lead to problems for the university with students all over campus exchanging Illinibucks for money. All in all, it could be a very effective plan as long as it is done efficiently and prices are set correctly.
The examples you use at the start of your second paragraph are good. But my question for you is - are the lines for these things really long now? I have only a small sample to consider on this, but I don't see students from our class queueing up to have office hours with me. The career fair example I have heard from others. But ask yourself this question. If that became the focus of Illinibucks use and if the number of students who attend the career fair doesn't change nor does the number of companies who interview there, will Illinibucks actually improve things?
ReplyDeleteAs to price setting with Illinibucks, somebody would have to monitor usage and then adjust price in response. It might take a while to find a price that seems to work and then demand can change over time, so such a price might be a moving target. Does that make sense?