For the past few days, I have been stressing out over the unreliable internet connection via Woof-Woof Wifi.
One night, I was in the middle of completing a portion of my Spanish homework online. I finally finished conjugating all the verbs to the present subjunctive form after almost thirty minutes. I was listening to music through Google Play while doing so, and I realized that my music had stopped playing. I knew by then that that meant my computer disconnected from the wifi. I had to wait at least twenty minutes for my connection to re-establish itself and when it finally did, I clicked the “submit answers” button. To my utter disbelief, I was informed that my answers were not recorded, penalizing me a total of ten points.
I should probably be used to it by now, being in my second year at Agnes, and being mindful of the fact that I am connected to a network that services several hundred devices (e.g. student and staff cell phones, personal laptops, campus computers, printers, etc). You have probably had similar experiences with our campus wifi. Your Netflix movie stopped loading or your Google Doc wouldn’t save because Woof-Woof was having a mood swing. Therefore, we all should be used to this unreliability, this irrational behavior that affects our academic, and personal, well-being.
Truthfully, I am not. But on the other hand, I am not easily defeated. I feel your agony on a spiritual level. Hopefully, these next few tips will help aid you in dealing with the annoyance that is Woof-Woof Wifi.
Don’t Panic
Seriously, everything will be fine. Plus, what gets done while you’re frantically trying to refresh the page on your browser expecting a connection? In the thoughts of an economist, the opportunity cost of the time you spend panicking could be time spent trying to find a solution. Or, and most likely, in this case, you can spend time taking a break from your work and patiently wait for your connection to re-establish.
Use Your Cell Phone Data
This is especially useful if you don’t take my advice above. Finish your Instagram scrolling and use your phone as a hotspot to connect to your laptop in order to finish your work.
Have a Hard Copy of Your Work
I know many professors post assignments to Moodle, but there are still some who give out hard copies of work in addition to the electronic documents online. If you do happen to get one, write all your scratch work on the hard copy so that if your connection is interrupted while submitting an assignment, at least your work is saved somewhere!
Save Your Work in Increments (if you can)
This may sound tedious and it may even be hard to remember, but saving your work as you go will save you a lot of heartbreak and valuable time. If you don’t remember to save things the first go-round, I’m sure you’ll remember to do so after an hour’s worth of work hasn’t been saved. I’m also pretty sure you don’t want points off for “blank” answers.
Get Off Campus
This may be straying away from actually dealing with the wifi, but if you absolutely have to get an assignment done with no interruption (or if you want to catch up on a show in a timely manner) get off campus. Some suggested spots include Java Monkey, the Decatur Public Library, or the Decatur Square.
Do you have an experience you want to share about your troubles with the campus wifi? Use the hashtag, #DealingWithWoofWoof to have your posts shared on our social media!