Thousands of the U.S. federal employees were sent home Tuesday after Congress failed to pass a short-term budget.
National parks and museums are closed. Services like the flu shot program and visa and passport renewals are on hold. Bloomberg reports that the shutdown will cost the U.S. economy $300 million a day.
Even Ryerson is feeling the effects.
The Library
The biggest issue Ryerson’s library will face is the closure of the medical and clinical database, PubMed, that is used frequently by the nursing and nutrition programs as well as any faculty doing medical research, says cataloging librarian Trina Grover.
PubMed is run by the U.S. government and the website is now running a disclaimer that states it will not be updating its collection.
The Library of Congress has shut down its electronic services, which can have negative effects on academic libraries in the long run.
Grover says that “at first, impact is minimal because we don’t get material directly from the Library of Congress.”
Library employees find alternate ways to document materials, create call numbers and catalog new materials. She says it will take a few months for it to be a problem because staff can use archival websites like Wayback machine.
International Student Services
American students at Ryerson received a distressing email from the International Students Services office Tuesday.
Diana Ning, the coordinator of International Student Services, emailed all international students. It read: “As of October 1st, 2013 the United States government has shut down. This will affect American citizens applying for passports and anyone applying for U.S. entry visas as these will not be processed.”
Furthermore, Ning noted that U.S. students who have applied for loans may have to wait longer than usual.
The ISS said that they are monitoring the situation and are available to students for any questions or concerns.
RSU in NYC
The RSU fall reading week trip to New York City is still on schedule, according to Danielle Brogran, the vice-president of student life and events at the RSU. The trip has 65 confirmed attendees on its Facebook group.
Reading week is just around the corner and the NYC trip leaves on Oct. 17 for three days. The trip is still on despite the fact that popular tourist sites including the Statue of Liberty are also shutdown.
“The trip is designed so that students can either tour around with us or they can go off and create their own adventure in New York,” Brogan says.
As for any international students who will require U.S. visas, she says they have been asked to arrange their travel paperwork beforehand.
Ryersonian reporter, Master of Journalism graduate 2014.