NARRATOR：

Listen to a conversation between a student and a computer lab administrator.

FEMALE STUDENT：

Excuse me. Do you know that all the printers over in the student center have stopped working?

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

There are eight printers connected to the computers there. You're saying they're all broken?

FEMALE STUDENT：

Yes, I just came from there. There're a lot of frustrated students. So many classes have papers due this afternoon that everyone's trying to print out their stuff at the same time.

Those printers got overworked and now they all have paper jams or some other problem. Can you fix them?

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

Well, not really. I'm just an administrator. Most of our actual technicians are students who take the job on the side.

FEMALE STUDENT：

Where are they?

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

Well, most of the students who work at the computer labs study at the engineering school and,uh, unfortunately, they all took the day off. I think they have some big exams tomorrow.

FEMALE STUDENT：

How can there be no technicians working on the biggest deadline day of the semester?

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

Well, there's one technician working at the computer lab in the arts building.

Uh, actually he just sent me an e-mail message saying there was a huge crowd there and he couldn't figure out why ...

FEMALE STUDENT：

Because people need to print their papers. There must be something you can do—people need those printers working.

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

Well, we just ordered new printers and next month we're replacing the old printers over in the student center with a brand-new set of printers.

FEMALE STUDENT：

But the deadline for submitting papers is just two hours away.

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

Well, I'm afraid there's nothing I can do. Uh, your best bet is to probably head to the arts building and get in line there.

FEMALE STUDENT：

But how did this happen again? Last semester when all the printers broke down, the president of the college got involved.

He sent out an e-mail message to all the students saying that he was going to personally do something to make sure that the situation was resolved.

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

That's right. When we had our budget meeting at the beginning of the semester, the president was there.

Uh, that's not something he usually does, but he wanted to make sure we ordered the new printers.

FEMALE STUDENT：

The new printers that are coming next month ...

MALE LAB ADMINISTRATOR：

Yeah. I ordered them as soon as the budget was approved. It's a shame, but the purchasing process being what it is...

Ah [Lightbulb moment.] You know what? It's possible some of the printers are malfunctioning because they ran out of ink.

I'm no technician but if that's what's wrong I could fix it...

I guess I'll grab some ink cartridges and, uh, go over to the student center and check.

No guarantees—sorry—but, ah, it might fix the problem.