All,

It is not at all clear to me why we need a bureaucratic solution to 
this problem, and setting up a small committee to deal with it is a 
bureaucratic solution.  The situation Dave Janes describe is largely 
correct.  Students hedge their bets and schedule multiple slots for 
equipment because they cannot predict how quickly earlier processing 
steps will be successfully completed. It's logical, but creates 
unnecessary delays and is inconsiderate of other users.

I would like to see the following policy implemented:

1. Signing up for any piece of equipment implies a commitment to pay 
for the time scheduled unless cancelled at least 12 hours before the 
start time reserved.
2. Missed reservations
     First offense: loss of privileges for 5 days.
     Second offense: loss of privileges for one month.
     Third offense: loss of privileges.

Part of our problem is the "three strikes" culture.  I favor an 
environment where all of us are accountable for our actions and we 
accept the responsibility to conduct ourselves in a manner suitable 
for a share-user facility FROM THE START.  The culture Dave described 
has been in place as long as I've been here (1997). This culture will 
only change if we install a new culture with well-defined guidelines 
and real consequences.  Telling the faculty that one of their students 
missed a reservation is a complete waste of time.  Let's take real 
action!

       Mike Capano







Quoting "David B. Janes" <janes@ecn.purdue.edu>:

Dimitri,

A small group to address this specific issue sounds like a good idea 
-- this could certainly address the short-term issues.   Involvement 
by the faculty advisor has been an important part of the process 
used by the disciplinary sub-committee, and I suggest that we 
include that also.

In the longer term, I think that we need to update our policies re 
equipment sign-up and cancellation, so that it's clear to everyone 
what is expected.

Dave

Peroulis, Dimitrios wrote:

Dave,

Thanks for your email. Besides Eric's and Steve's suggestions, 
there was also a proposal from me yesterday.

As for the P&P committee handling the issue, I believe it is a bit 
too big to handle this. The P&P only gets together once a month or 
so and many times there are irresolvable conflicts for faculty 
(e.g. teaching - that was the case for me last semester). On the 
other hand, the subcommittee that handles violations (headed by Tim 
Fisher) is much smaller and has meetings on a need-to-discuss basis 
when a problem arises. I believe we need to handle this issue that 
way.

Thanks
Dimitri



-----Original Message-----
From: bnc-faculty-all-list-bounces@ecn.purdue.edu 
[ mailto:bnc-faculty-all-list-bounces@ecn.purdue.edu] On Behalf Of 
David B. Janes
Sent: Saturday, August 28, 2010 3:56 PM
To: Jeff Goecker
Cc: Weaver, John R; BNC Faculty
Subject: Re: [Bnc-faculty-all-list] Coral Reservation Abuse - 
ACTION REQUESTED - on behalf of John Weaver

BNC Faculty Colleagues:

As part of this thread, Eric and Steve have made suggestions 
regarding how to rectify the situation.  I would like to point out 
that the Policy and Procedures committee has discussed this general 
issue several times in the past (although not the specific recent 
situation addressed in John's email).  While "suspend privileges" 
or "charge the account even if the equipment is not used" may be 
valid approaches in some situations/equipment, there are legitimate 
cases where a reserved slot cannot be used.  For example, in many 
processes, a number of pieces of equipment are needed in sequence; 
if one piece of equipment is down, there is no use for the next 
piece of equipment.  Likewise, if a prior processing step does not 
work properly.  Couple this with the fact that we have a number of 
time-critical process steps, and there will be unavoidable times 
where a sign-up slot would not be used - and would not likely be of 
use to other people (since they would not have time to perform the 
prior processing steps).

That being said, the situation described in John's email is way 
beyond these circumstances. Please discuss the situation with your 
students -- particularly those who have been frequent violators.
I view this as one of several "citizenship" issues that we have at Birck
-- other issues include mis-use/breakage of equipment, failure to 
clean up after one's self, and use of other groups' specialty 
chemicals/supplies without permission and/or without contributing 
to replacement costs.

By way of cc, I will ask John and/or Jeff to provide a copy of the 
spreadsheet (omitted from the original email),

As I said in an earlier email, we have put the P&P committee on 
indefinite hold -- primarily due to lack of participation by 
faculty.  If you would like to participate in shaping BNC lab 
access and safety policies, the P&P committee would be an excellent 
venue.

Dave


Jeff Goecker wrote:

BNC Faculty ­

>>>

I need your help on a situation that is impacting the ability of 
researchers to use the BNC equipment.  We are beginning to reach 
epidemic proportions of people reserving equipment and not using 
the equipment ­ and not cancelling their reservations so that 

>>> someone else can use that equipment.  This practice causes false 

bottlenecks and leaves the equipment unused.  In the first 8 weeks 
of this fiscal year, we have had 1165 incidents.

An example is one user who has 20 unused and not canceled 
reservations on the MJB-3 aligner in 8 weeks ­ that’s 2 ½ unused 

>>> reservations every week.  This is a very highly used piece of 

equipment, and we are receiving complaints that this equipment is 
not available.  This same user has 12 unused and not canceled 
reservations on the CHA evaporator ­ another critical piece of 

>>> equipment.

The CHA evaporator has had 82 unused and not canceled reservations 
in the last 8 weeks, more than 10 per week.

Please ask your students to be more courteous to the other 
researchers in the BNC.  The attached spreadsheet shows those 
users with at least
8 unused and not cancelled reservations in the past 8 weeks by 
Coral user name.  I have also highlighted incidents where one user 
had at least 8 unused and not cancelled reservations on a 
particular piece of equipment.

While it is understood that there are legitimate incidents where a 
user reserves a piece of equipment but cannot use it, this 
happening at a very high frequency is more likely abuse.

Thanking you for your consideration,

John

*/John R. Weaver/*

*/Facility Manager/*

*/Birck Nanotechnology Center/*

*/Purdue University/*

*/(765) 494-5494/*

*/jrweaver@purdue.edu/*

*/
/*
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