Night students left out in the dark

Woe to the night students: Their education takes place on a campus already ravaged by day students who leave messes in classrooms and deplete CSUS of the one resource everyone uses -- bathroom tissue.

"There is never any toilet paper or paper towels in the restrooms in the evening," said night student Lisa Guillen.

But the scarcity of hygiene supplies is a minor annoyance compared to another problem facing night students.

Most university offices are closed by they time they arrive on campus. The admissions and records office and most of the department offices close at 5 p.m.

Out of CSUS' 23,676 students, 9,500 attend school at night.

This is about 40 percent of all students. The amount of night students is steadily increasing, up from 38 percent last year.

Other offices such as the career center and cashiers office closes earlier at 4 p.m. For Aileen Mercado, a senior majoring in communication studies, this means taking time off work in order to take care of school-related paperwork.

Students who need to turn in their add forms, drop off papers in a teacher's mailbox, or take care of any other business must make other arrangements.

"It's hard to get any paperwork done after 5:30," said Felicia Miller, another night student. She is responsible for creating a drop box for the Communication Studies department, which previously to the box, suggested sliding add and drop petitions under the department office door after it is closed.

Most restaurants such as Taco Bell, Stix, the Grill, Pastina's Italian cafe, Garden Fresh and the Market Shoppe are closed by 7 p.m.

"It's hard to talk to evaluators after 4 p.m.," said Mercado, who plans to graduate in the spring.

"There are quite a few evening students on campus, I think, that try one office and if it is closed, don't realize that other offices are open," said Tom Griffith, director of the advising center.

The academic advising center is open until 6 p.m. Monday through Thursday.

"We are the only office on campus that is consistently open in the evening, so we try to work with other offices," said Griffith.

If there are questions that the advising staff can not answer, such as a question about financial aid, and that office is closed, the adviser will find the answer the next day and call the student at work, Griffith said.

The office will also accept graduation petitions and other paperwork that needs to be turned into the admissions and records office and turn it in for the student the next day.

Unfortunately academic advisers can't accept money for the cashier's office.

"At one point in time we tried to stay open until 7 p.m., but found that 90 percent of our traffic is before six," said Griffith.

There is also a smaller variety of classes offered at night compared to during the day.

"Evening students only get a fraction of the classes offered," said Miller, "yet we pay the exact same tuition as day students."

In many cases there is only one section of a class offered in the evening, but during day classes, there are up to 10 sections of the same class available.

Certain classes are not offered at all in the evening. Mercado must now start going to school during the day because the classes she needs to graduate are not offered at night.

When first introduced, the OneCard was offered free to replace old CSUS I.D.s, but the period of time when students could get them replaced free was during the day. Night students had to pay the $5 fee for another I.D.

Another popular complaint among night students is campus cleanliness. By the time night students arrive, a day's worth of messes are left in their classrooms. Students report that many supplies are gone when night classes start.

Both Guillen and Miller agree, however, that being a night student does have a few advantages.

Both the library and reserve book room are open late, and there is rarely a line to use the terminals in the library.

For those who need something to eat during their 7:30 break, all hope is not lost. The Outpost and Pub are open until 9 p.m., Burger King until 8 p.m.

"Parking is easier in the evenings," Guillen said, since students can use most faculty lots after 4:30 p.m.

Fall '98 marks Tiffany Kirk's first semester as a night student at CSUS. She said that the night teachers are different than the teachers during the day.

"They're professionals, people more like me who work for a living and have families while going to school," said Guillen.

"The atmosphere in the evening is different, it's nice. The campus itself is very quiet. There are not so many people."