“Oh, no, I forgot my cell phone in the computer lab.”

Depending on where such an item is lost at NIU, chances are that running over to a lost-and-found box won’t do much good.

“We don’t get cell phones,” said Stephanie Bailey, a junior corporate communication major and Lincoln Hall front desk worker. “If you lose a cell phone, you just lost it. I don’t think anyone is going to turn a cell phone in to the lost and found.”

On the other hand, a misplaced phone at the Holmes Student Center might have a better chance of returning to its owner’s hands.

“A few times a month, cell phones are lost and brought in,” said Allison Osterberg, a senior communication and journalism major and student supervisor for the center’s front desk.

Throughout the year, personal items are lost all over campus, taking all sorts of journeys before returning & and sometimes not returning & to their rightful owners.

Joyce Johnson, guest room manager at the student center, said gloves, hats, wallets and IDs are the most common items brought to her.

“When the front desk isn’t open, we get a little bit of everything,” she said.

If a student’s name is on a lost item & as with IDs or wallets & then the student will be contacted to come pick it up.

But people don’t always come. Currently, Lincoln Hall has more than 25 different driver’s licenses and NIU OneCards waiting to be claimed.

In the end, most items end up at the police station. Weekly pick-ups are made at the student center and Founders Memorial Library, said Donna Hurley, University Police clerk for records and lost-and-found.

“We go through items and determine what has identification to contact them,” she said. “We go through everything we can to locate the owner.”

Identifiable items usually include wallets, IDs, clothing and sometimes lost books with names in them, which is good, Hurley said, because books cost students a lot of money.

A call is placed or a letter is mailed to any owner police are able to identify.

The average item is held for six months, after which the person who turned it in has the opportunity to keep it.