The Computer Lounge is the implementation of an idea of Hon. Ashu Marasinghe (who was the then president of the Students’ Union). He proposed this idea as the president of the Students’ Council Students’ Union of the Faculty of Science in 1997 to the then Vice Chancellor of the University of Colombo, Prof. The main objective of setting up the lounge was to facilitate access to computers to all the
students of the Faculty of Science. Back then, while the students who followed computer science had access to computers in their own laboratories, other students were facing many difficulties due to lack of access to the computers. The Vice Chancellor relating the value of the proposal and its importance to the students of the faculty, immediately agreed to provide five computers and a printer to setup the lounge. He also promised that the University will provide four computers each year for the next three years. Samaranayake, who was the director of the Institute of Computer Technology, provided a room at the entrance of the ICT building to setup the lounge. The Computer Lounge was the only place where students could access the internet freely. A committee was setup to overlook the administration of the lounge and Dr. Keerthi Premadasa, who was the Director of Career Guidance Unit agreed to supervise the operations of the Computer Lounge through the Career Guidance Unit of the University of Colombo. Since then the Computer Lounge is managed and coordinated by a group of students in the Faculty of Science. Around year 2000, an idea to create a library with computer books was presented by Dr. Ravindra De Silva, who was a student of the Faculty of Science back then. Dimantha (who was the then president of the Students’ Union) with the help of Dr. Keerthi Premadasa, who was the director of the Career Guidance Unit. Students back then has done a IT exhibition to build a hostel for the University, but since it was not easy to build in Colombo area, they use those funds to buy new IT books and create the Lounge Library. This was the reason to have many computer based books in the Lounge Library in the present. At that time, the graduates of the University of Colombo were recruited to jobs with higher demand because they were said to be had a great knowledge in IT. Both Computer Lounge and Lounge Library was directly affected to that demand of the University. Today Lounge Library is not only having computer based books, it has many books in all fields of study including books to read in leisure times. Lounge Library is also helping students to do their studies easily with providing references guides and other educational guides. Today the Computer Lounge has been expanded to a network of many computers and with the new WiFi system, computer lounge is providing internet facilities to students’ laptops so they’re able to browse internet and search for study materials easily. Also the Computer Lounge provides services such as giving printouts including color printouts for a cheaper price and providing required technical support to students of the Faculty when they face issues with their computers.
