Saint Louis University scrapped around 120 faculty and admin positions in March 2017 and also ditched 130 vacant capacities. The previous fiscal year, the school had a $16 million deficit. And NOW, it’s decided to purchase Amazon Echos, those little gadgets that play music, search the Internet, and make calls all hands-free with that friendly robot Alexa, reported The College Fix. Oh and remember, this is also one of those devices that collects user data, with which it does who knows what.
Amazon Echos go for $50 on Amazon and Saint Louis University is buying one for each of its more than 2,300 dorm rooms on campus. That comes out to $115,000, though the school did say it bought them at a discount. David Hakanson, the university’s vice president, said that “every minute we can save our students from having to search for the information they need online is another minute that they can spend focused on what matters most: their education.”
You know that it takes roughly the same amount of time to type a question out on Google as it does to ask it orally, right? Also, have you ever heard of this thing called RESEARCH? Learning how to find things yourself is a pretty crucial part of education. Anyways, this wouldn’t be quite so egregious if this weren’t the same school that recently made over a hundred layoffs and is expecting a $10 to $20 million loss each year.
At $42,166, Saint Louis University’s tuition price is already over $7,000 higher than the average cost at private universities — wouldn’t this money be better spent on scholarships?
