It’s no secret that dorm damages seem to be racking up this year for certain residence halls on campus. There have been stories of broken exit signs, urination in elevators, broken ceiling tiles and vomit in hallways since the first few weeks of school. Surprisingly, damages this year have not been any worse than past years.
“I was a Floor Governor of Park my sophomore year, and I would say it’s about the same,” Park Housefellow Monica Moszczyc ’15 said. “And I know my first year was especially bad. I lived in Morrisson, not in Park, and whenever I would walk on this side of the Plex going from Park to Johnson was just awful.” She continued with how she had talked with the Park custodian, Edwin, apologizing about the damages; however, he said they were nothing compared to his first two years at the College.
Jane Addams Housefellow Eleanor Hardy ’15 had similar comments. “I think this year’s been really great until recently,” Hardy said. “There’s definitely a correlation between how stressed people are and how dorm damages occur. So, for example, last weekend [October 17-19] was our first set of dorm damages and that was the weekend after midterms. There is definitely a relationship between the two and people just having nothing else to do and wanting to release stress.
Hardy has been working with Residential Life for the past three years in South, including Freeman, Harkness and now J.A., and has become familiar with these damages.
“Especially down South, a lot of the dorm damages that happen here are not by people who live here, which is really frustrating for the people who live here as well as the house staff, because this is where people tend to come on the weekends. If there’s nothing better to do, they just break things and leave,” Hardy said.
The Sticker Initiative was intended to make students consider the cost of the damage they do when they knowingly destroy college property. Price tags were stuck on commonly vandalized items such as fire extinguishers, exit signs and soap dispensers as a way to encourage accountability.
North campus area coordinator Frida Rodriguez said, “The other day we were talking in our office about high stress levels and people taking it out on alcohol consumption, which will then turn into vomit, or just very aggressive behavior that will lead to someone punching an exit sign that’s just there,” Rodriguez said. “I would say that [it’s] not being sensible to the rest of the people in the house because then the people [living] in the house have to pay for those damages, as well for the custodial staff member who then has to come and clean it.”
Overall on campus, there have been some smaller incidents each weekend; however, they have been worse during certain weekends for different residence halls on campus.
Moszczyc stated that there have been several instances of dorm damages on the west side of the Plex, but nothing out of the ordinary.
“I’d say this year there’s really only been two isolated incidents, two big nights of vandalism, and other than that, we haven’t had that much. So I guess it differs from past years in that way.”
Damages also do not have to be reported through a floor governor or house fellow. Any student is able to write up a report on CamelWeb for any damages they witness occurring on campus.
