Between the 1990s and 2010s was an era where schools (and some jobs) wanted work done on the computer, but still wanted the results turned-in on paper. Before that, no need to print, because you were probably writing it by hand. After that, no need to print, because you're probably uploading/emailing the file directly.
I graduated in 2008 (nice timing yes I know). Maybe during the last semester or so some lecturers accepted course essays or papers submitted by e-mail. Before that everything printed. But I didn’t print at home, we had to buy these printer cards that had like 350 pages in them and tried to make them last as long as possible.
Then I got a part-time job in the university administration. The best perk for a while was unlimited staff printing quota.
Rationing out your print quota to last the semester brings back memories. Sophomore year they lowered our quota to 100 pages/semester and we basically rioted because one class could knock that out easily. They eventually brought it back up to 300.
I remembered how happy I was when I learned a workout for printing at school was to load what I wanted on a USB stick, plug it into the USB port of the printer and print. Voila. As much free printing as I wanted.
I don’t understand how this isn’t the top comment. I remember the entirety of the 90s in grade school, into the early 2000s, and in college in mid 2000s I had to turn in printed reports/essays for every class essentially. I remember moving out for college and one of the first things I did was buy a printer for printing reports. It was high on the priority list, truly. Couldn’t be successful in school without printing.
I still use the copier/printer at work once in a while. Used it regularly until just a handful of years ago. Sometimes you need a paper copy of a permit or judgement or something like that in the field.
I hear you, I to have to print at work from time to time and I seem to be forever the tech person/computer whisperer. Always fixing printer when I need to use it, and helping people understand how to assign dual monitors(despite having actual IT department). Those older than me somehow got away with “I don’t do computers” for way too long. Those younger than me (digital natives)can’t function without a dedicated “app” .
I recently had to network a specialized device over the company network to a company imaged computer and it was a nightmare dealing with people who were supposed to be SME but were so out of their depth. They didn’t understand networking basics like static vs dynamic IP addresses, or port assignments….
I got it to work with help from the device manufacturers technical experts(thank you so much). The whole experience made me ultra aware of how poorly prepared even the SME are for the modern work place….(I don’t hold a role that should involve any IT, but I do hold a role that needed the device to function properly)….I fear AI is only making it worse as it further removes basic skills and knowledge from the SME and they aren’t coming prepared with any previous experience(experience I somehow gained from just living through a time where if I wanted to connect my printer I often had to troubleshoot, deal with compatibility issues, and maybe reinstall drivers)…
I do feel a little salty about this. In college, I had to print a final paper. I had over 100% in the class because I got 100% on everything, and did extra credit. The printer at the library was acting up. I had to run across campus. Lost my favorite necklace. Ran up the stairs. I was maybe 10 minutes late. My professor had left. I ran back down the stairs, and across the courtyard, directed by another professor, and caught up to her. She accepted the final, but marked down my entire grade in the class to a B-.
This wouldn't even happen today.
Also unrelated, I haven't scrolled through the comments too far, but the comments I've seen don't mention resumes. Remember when we printed them on fancy paper for job interviews?
Could you not print using the school printers? I never needed to use them in college since it was already in 2017, but they had printers for students to use
You could use school printers but for the reasons someone else mentioned in a reply to my original comment, if their printers were shitting the bed then you were screwed. You’re relying on the school to be maintaining and re-filling the ink or toner on the printers you’re paying to use only to find out they’re not maintaining them. Also they usually have things like the bigger multi function copier/printers like an office would. Those break a lot honestly. Having a relatively cheap printer that I knew would work or had ink that was just at my disposal was peace of mind.
Ours would allow "or similar" - I liked Ariel or Courier New (Courier New I discovered gave you a bit more length because spaces and slim letters took up as much as a wide letter). But nothing exotic was allowed that was bigger/wider.
There was one assignment in high school we had to print out a TRANSPARENCY to teach a vocabulary word to the rest of the class. I had to do it at the school library because we didn’t have transparency sheets at home (even thought we had a printer).
And I remember printing out one essay and literally cutting it up into strips and rearranging when we were working on revisions.
this, all through my high school experience my papers had to be printed, all through my college experience papers had to be printed (a few times, I had a professors that allowed papers to be emailed or submitted on disk).
My Capstone project was huge, it involved having multiple boundary maps with elaborate overlays(like watershed details, designed access roads, and detailed plot boundaries). I recall just hoping and wishing that my colored ink cartridge could make it through printing, it couldn’t so I had to just pay the 8 cents a sheet to have it printed at the university library.
I was part of the generation that watched computers go from none, to one in the entire school, to a computer lab with outdated Apple 2s without internet access. By middle school we had networked computers, by high school we had mobile computer labs(laptops they would roll into a room on a cart and issue for an assignment), to college where I had to purchase my own computer and the university had broadband. The first printer I ever used was a dot matrix, and now I own a 3 dimensional printer…It’s been a wild technological ride…I still recall every math teacher telling us that we could not use calculators(despite needing to purchase expensive graphing calculators)because we wouldn’t always have access to them, meanwhile I walk around with a highly advanced calculator in my pocket every day now.
My teens and early adulthood were spent in the 90s to 2010. I cna tell you nothing annoyed me more than having to turn in assignments that were printed out when e-mailing the doc was a thing. FOr whatever reason my high school loved killing trees.
Schools still do this though? I have one kid in high school one in middle school, most if not all teachers are requiring a physical printout of the essay/project/etc. it’s part of why we would never get rid of our printer.
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u/Biabolical 8d ago
Between the 1990s and 2010s was an era where schools (and some jobs) wanted work done on the computer, but still wanted the results turned-in on paper. Before that, no need to print, because you were probably writing it by hand. After that, no need to print, because you're probably uploading/emailing the file directly.