Tiger Diggs Internet issues cause problems

Residents have had problems submitting assignments online.

By Megan Pearl

Published Dec. 11, 2009

Residents in the extended campus living community Tiger Diggs are paying the same rates as students living on campus, but they are not getting the same service when it comes to Internet said Blake Lawrence, Residential Halls Association speaker of Congress.

"We launched a campaign to get everyone to e-mail Joe Kelley, the Hall Coordinator for Tiger Diggs," Lawrence said. "If it doesn't get better by February we're going to start looking into some serious response on our part."

According to the Residential Life Web site, the extended campus living communities were adopted in response to the large influx of freshmen and incoming students.

"We have been having some problems," Tiger Diggs resident Paul Reeves said. "Sometimes the Internet works, sometimes it doesn't. It's not a huge problem. It's more obnoxious than anything, and we have a computer lab we can use.”

Residential Life Director Frankie Minor has been working with the company Campus Advantage to find a solution to the problems.

Campus Advantage is a part of a private company that works specifically in student housing and operates in 20 states near college campuses.

"We've been in touch with the corporate office and sharing our concerns," Minor said. "The contract we have with them promises Internet."

Minor said the largest concern was for access to academic Web sites and completing assignments online. Many classes employ the services of Blackboard or have online homework through the textbooks that require the Internet.

"For my math class, I sometimes have problems uploading or saving the answers," Tiger Diggs resident Chris Westfall said. "They would like to get it fixed so we don't have to worry about if we can get our homework done or get on the Internet."

Although the residence hall coordinators are employed by MU, the apartments still officially belong to Campus Advantage.

"Our challenge is that typically, when there is a problem in one of our residence halls, we have the ability to take direct steps to fix it, but in this situation we're merely trying to represent the nearly 400 students out there to the corporate office," Minor said. "Not only would our students benefit, but so would the rest of the MU students who are not a part of our master lease out there."

A lawsuit over the Internet and failure to meet the demands of the contract has been rumored, but the Department of Residential Life denies these claims. Minor said a lawsuit would not solve the problem of the students not having readily available Internet access, but they have brought the point in the contract to the attention of the corporation.

"I have less concerns for their restrictions to play Halo than I do their ability to access Blackboard, which we have tried to impress upon Campus Advantage," Minor said. "It's essential that the students have access to that."