The Voice of CCNU "Have returned the bike successfully, please check the basket and don't forget your belongings." A slightly playful voice comes from the blue and green shared electric bikes with the logo of CCNU. In the new semester, not only the youthful students but also the rows of brand-new shared electric bikes arrived at the university with the spring spirit. The emergence of "magically replacing walking vehicles" has really led to a boom of use on campus. In front of No.8Teaching Building, next to The Nanhu Complex Building, or by The South Gate, you can always see students scanning the code and riding the bikes.
If you pay close attention to the campus, you will find that in addition to the newly introduced shared electric bikes, the university has also arranged for many other shared products on campus, such as the shared power banks behind No.6 Teaching Building and in No.8 Teaching Building, the shared umbrellas on the first floor of the Library, and the shared laundry machines in each dormitory building.
Through the survey on the understanding and use of shared products on campus, we can learn from the feedback that all CCNUers in the sample support the introduction of shared products on campus. This indicates that the introduction of shared products on campus has facilitated students' lives to a certain extent and maximized the use of some resources in the context of the continuous development of the sharing economy. Among the above-mentioned shared products, students know and use the shared washing machines and electric bikes the most.
The newly shared electric bikes are a convenient way for students to get around and provide an alternative option for students to travel between campuses and in the main campus. Compared to students purchasing electric bikes, the shared electric bikes reduce the risk of losing the bikes and the cost of maintaining the bikes. Wu Yunjin, a student from Class 2020 of School of Economics and Business Administration said, "For students like me who live in Nanhu campus but need to travel between the main campus and the Nanhu campus, the shared electric bikes have brought me a lot of convenience. Just the number of bikes is so small that sometimes I can't find one at the parking spot in Nanhu campus.”
Few distribution points and small number of shared electric bikes are the common feedbacks from the students in the survey. At present, the distribution points of shared electric bikes are only No.8 Teaching Building, No.9 Teaching Building，The South Gate in the main campus and dormitory building 1,5,and 11 in Nanhu campus . If it is a sunny day, there are only few shared electric bikes at each distribution point. The same problem also presents in other shared products on campus: the number of washing machines in the dormitory buildings is small, while the cycle of using every single time is long, so the phenomenon of queuing to use washing machines happens repeatedly; the high density of students in the teaching buildings have a great demand for the use of power banks, but the supply of them is not sufficient. With the original intention of sharing for convenience, the students are faced with the dilemma of "sweeping away". Wang Jiayi, a student from Class 2020 of School of Political Communication said that the "self-cleaning" function of the shared laundry machines is really reassuring, but the small number of laundry machines and the high fees have become a barrier to their use.
When it comes to the use of shared laundry machines, the resident manager of dormitory building 14 in Nanhu campus said, "Some students have reflected that the laundry machines undersupply, and we will try our best to find a solution. But overall, the washing machines are very convenient for the students. "How can we put the good idea of sharing for convenience into practice? That's what we're thinking and asking based on the present situation. The problems along with the convenience are inevitable dilemmas that will be faced when shared products enter the campus, and it is a challenge for both publishers and users.
The authors believe that in the wave of the sharing economy, campus sharing should not only have the ability to wade into the surf but also the determination to ride the winds and break the waves and should firmly walk together with users, starting from the deepest part and making a voice from the subtlest part. In addition to purchasing additional products to solve the problem of undersupply, operators of shared products also need to put some effort into distribution settings and fee management. For example, they should reasonably plan the distribution locations of shared electric bikes and appropriately set up more parking spots; set reasonable fees to stabilize the consumption of shared products by taking the market fee system and the consumption level of today's college students into account; and set up quick channels for problem feedback and solution in the relevant APP and WeChat applet to manage the use of products in real time.
Introducing shared products on campus and keeping up with the trend is our way of learning from society and active interaction with the times, and we should also absorb, reflect and summarize from the development of campus sharing. We have reasons to believe that through the establishment of a good communication and sharing platform and the creation of an efficient and timely feedback mechanism, campus sharing will be able to keep pace with the times and sail on the waves with the joint efforts of you and me.
Translator: Yang Fan
Date: March 26,2021
