If you want to focus on a rigorous course load without having to worry about the fairly time-consuming activities that go along with renting an apartment, you might look at the U’s dorms as a suitable option. And for many, the dorms are just fine. Some residents, however, have recently been demonstrating that they might be a bad fit for the dorms.
Throughout the past several weeks, there have been multiple incidents of vandalism in the U’s Sage Point residence halls (which house a mixture of freshmen and upperclassmen). This includes vandalism of exit signs and fire extinguisher casings and the theft of fire extinguishers. Last, and certainly most classy, there have been multiple incidents of people urinating in the elevators of two Sage Point buildings.
Frank Sitton, associate director of facilities with the U’s Housing and Residential Education department, has been forced to consider several changes in order to curb this vandalism. In Sage Point 812, he has closed the use of the elevator completely until the perpetrators are revealed. He is considering changing the exit signs during the summer to make them less attractive to vandals by replacing them with signs that sit flush against a wall instead of hanging from a ceiling.
As per the residence hall handbook, all expenses resulting from vandalism repairs are to be distributed equally among residents and charged to their housing accounts. That means everyone is being punished for the actions of some kid who got a hold of some Boone’s Farm and thought it might be interesting to urinate in the elevator.
I’m sure this is, for many residents, their first time away from home. I can only imagine how absolutely freeing it must feel to be able to smoke cigarettes at 3 a.m. without that pesky parent figure harassing them. But seriously, urine in the elevators? Are you kidding me? Before I moved into the residence halls, I thought I was immature. Once you’ve urinated in the elevators you should know you’re an ass-hat.
There’s no doubt that for many, these fines, now reaching the $15 to $20 range, are somehow miraculously charged to their old man’s American Express card. Still, there are others who pay out of their own pockets to live in the U’s residence halls and not only have to live with these people, but pay for their messes as well.
Unless you want to endure the seemingly endless barrage of juvenile hijinks (my God, these kids are making me use square words from rock-and-roll-hating adults in the ’50s) in what essentially amounts to a junior high stay-over summer camp, avoid the U’s residence halls.
John Hannon