by Shari Dinkins

When we find supplies or equipment missing on campus, our immediate thought is: students. The response is so basic, so quick that we may not access the rational part of our brains. Odd true story: at one state university, students stole the balls from the mice in the computer lab. Yes, clever young adults actually took the time to flip the mouse upside down, unscrewed the plate, removed the heavy rubber ball and replaced the plate. Newer optical mice should foil the thieves--but it’s amazing that something so strange, and useless, is a target for theft. “If it’s not nailed down,” my dean once said, “they’ll take it.” I nodded. It never occurred to me that he might have meant anyone other than students.

The truth? Instructors do their share. And part-timers are the hardest to nail down. Floating from campus to campus, we can be found rummaging in supply closets at several campuses. Standing at a copy machine, originals are fed in and hundreds of clean, white copies spill out into the tray.

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