Editorial Board
In the spring and fall transition months, regulating the heat in on-campus buildings becomes more challenging. Students have commented on what feels like an excessive amount of heating in the resident halls.
“It’s nice to have heat but it gets to a point where we need to use our window air conditioners to compensate. It gets too hot and there isn’t any way to control it because they end up turning off the air conditioning units,” sophomore Steven Gulandri said. “Last year was worse because I would wear shorts inside because it felt like a desert but as soon as I would step outside I was reminded that it was the thick of winter.”
While it initially seem to be easy to point the finger and demand a change in the heating system, students should understand that a request like that isn’t so simple.
“One day the temperature can be 80 degrees, and the next it drops down to 50 degrees. Maintaining that shift in temperature is harder than the summer and winter months when the temperature is either consistently hot or cold,” Manager of Environmental Services Ron Roth said.
The heating regulations within each building ultimately depend on the age of the building. Newer buildings have automatic heating systems which allows each room to have it’s own thermostat. Older buildings have only one or two thermostats to maintain the heat of the entire building. Members of the Heat Plant staff manually control the heating systems in the older buildings. These staff members make rounds to on-campus buildings every morning to check the temperature.
Dormitories face the same sort of temperature issues. Dolan Hall has one thermostat that regulates the temperature for one side of the building, and another thermostat that regulates the other side. Harriett Fuller House has a thermostat in every single bedroom. “It is a large advantage to have thermostats in each room because it allows for students to be more comfortable,” Roth said. “Every person has a different comfortable temperature which makes things difficult.”
Recent temperature complaints have been made in Pfeiffer Hall. The heating system issues in Pfeiffer are due to several leaks and thermostat issues which the Heat Plant staff members are currently handling. “I had to have my RA call Physical Plant to come into my room and fix my heater,” said sophomore Paige Buschman. “It was so hot in my room, I wasn’t able to sleep.”
The Heat Plant encourages students, faculty and staff to contact them if they have any complaints about the temperature of a particular building. “The people who spend time in on-campus buildings are the eyes and ears for these sorts of issues. We understand people have expectations and we want to do whatever we can to meet those,” Roth said.