The 2012 season is bringing many changes to the Ohio State football program, but the one that might effect students most is the revamped student ticketing process.

This year there are eight games included in the student football package. On the quarter system, all pre-season games had to be purchased separately.

“Under the quarter system, students had the option of purchasing the season ticket package, all of the games while school was in session, and could also purchase the games before school started at a student rate,” said assistant athletic director for ticketing Brett Scarbrough.

Scarbrough said under the semester system students could purchase the full season package, or the Big Ten Conference package which includes the last four games played at home this season against the University of Nebraska, Purdue University, University of Illinois and the University of Michigan.

The full season price for tickets is $256 plus a service charge while the Big Ten Package, is $128 plus a service charge.

The student rate is $32 per ticket, which Scarbrough said is not an increase from last year.

Kate Nushart, the associate director of ticket operations at OSU said students bought 14,513 full season packages and 11,448 Big Ten packages for the upcoming season. Before the start of the 2011 season, fans purchased 22,806 student packages.

However, some students opted not to purchase tickets this year because of program penalties.

“There was no chance in going to a bowl game, so there wasn’t a point in buying them,” said Julio Garcia, a fourth-year in psychology.

Garcia said the increased price would have been a factor in his decision to buy the tickets, even with the extra games added.

“I’d rather get my money’s worth instead of seeing a blowout,” he said.

In addition to changing the types of student ticket packages available, the Athletic Council decided to change the system used by students to purchase tickets.

The Athletic Counsel is a body of the university senate that sets policy relating to athletics at OSU, including ticket allocation.

“We have our own ticketing website, Buckeyes Account Manager. That is what we’ve used to sell student tickets. It wasn’t really built for that,” Scarbrough said.

“The first time (I ordered tickets) it took forever to load,” Garcia said.

Garcia said the old system kicked him out of the virtual wait line and he was not able to purchase a ticket for one of the optional games.

Tickets are now purchased through Ticketmaster to allow for the high amounts of orders going through at one time.

Scarbrough says the additional service charge has not changed or increased.