By: Tatum Hunter
The two four-sided kiosks, built within the last month, feature a campus map, a digital slideshow of Xavier-related photos, a Xavier advertisement and a corkboard for students to post flyers. Students and visitors can find one kiosk on the academic mall and another outside Cintas Center.
The decision to build the kiosks was made by the Student Government Association (SGA) in conjunction with the Office of Physical Plant. The initiative cost a total of $18 thousand, with $1,482 contributed by SGA Senate and the rest contributed by the SGA Executives. A check was given to the Office of Physical Plant for the kiosks in April 2012, during the previous SGA Executives’ term.
Since Alter Hall closed, many campus clubs and organizations lost space to advertise for events, as many other buildings on campus do not allow flyers to be posted.
SGA agreed to fund the kiosk project on the condition that the kiosks featured some kind of space for student clubs and organizations to advertise.
Aside from being a place where clubs and organizations can communicate with the student body, the kiosks also serve as resource for first-year students or visitors who may be navigating campus for the first time. However, some members of the campus community have questioned whether building the kiosks was a wise allocation of funds.
“It’s hard to say whether this (decision) was an appropriate allocation (of funds),” current SGA President Drew Dziedzic said. “It was made so long ago, and I personally do not know what the previous executives considered when making that decision. I probably would not have advocated for these (kiosks). That said, now that we have them, I want to find ways to make them effective.”