Case in Point
The
tick-tock epidemic
 By
Elizabeth Leffall
The Collegian
Have you ever heard a whirring
or loud buzzing in one of your classes? Has your professor ever done a
double take at wall objects spinning so fast you thought the objects were
possessed? If so, you have become a victim of Fresno State’s tick-tock
epidemic.
Many clocks all over campus have proudly shown the wrong time, for a long
time. Some students now walk into class at 8 o’clock expecting to
see the clock showing 6 o’clock. It seems to have become a part
of campus life.
It makes you wonder if campus personnel have ever entered the classrooms
when school is not in session to check things out.
Has anyone every complained? Does anyone care?
Would someone please fix them?
Case in Point
During the first week of school, several students sitting in McKee Fisk
room 242 waited for their professor to arrive. Bored, they watched the
clock in their classroom and tried to bet where the clock’s hour
hand would stop.
One student said “Oh, they’re just trying to set the clock
to the right time.”
Another student snorted with laughter and said, “You must be new.”
Yes, she was a freshman.
All of the sudden the clock’s hands began spinning out of control
and sped right past the current time to land on a time six hours past
the actual time.
Another student laughed and joked. “If the clocks were right, we
still wouldn’t believe it,” she said. “They’ve
been that wrong for that long.”
Case in Point
Students in an evening class in Speech Arts room 150 joked about the same
problem. One student offered an in-depth explanation to the mystery behind
the whizzing clocks.
“You see, the school has all the clocks on one system. They hired
a clock person who sits at a desk and manually sets the clocks daily.
But, because of budget cuts, they had to let him go. Now they depend on
anyone who will, to help them out,” he said.
Wow, this student took some time to think this through; actually it’s
kind of scary how much time he took.
When the professor of this class finished taking roll he looked at the
clock and said, “Hmm, maybe that’s why students are always
late.”
Yes professor, that’s it. If those clocks aren’t fixed, we’ll
use that excuse from now on.
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