by Cole Hiller
It’s the time of year that the weather is changing and the temperatures in classrooms and dorms feel uncomfortable. So, we at the Cento decided to do a poll over Instagram to see what students have to say about the temperature around campus.
We took two polls to see if opinions changed throughout the week as the weather changed. The first one we conducted around February 11th. We had 52% of respondents saying their dorm was too hot, 40% saying it was just right, and 8% saying it was too cold. We conducted our second polling on the 17th, and found that 51% of people said their room was too hot, 42% said it was just right, and the other 7% said it was too cold.
Some students reached out to us to clarify their votes in the polls. One student mentioned having their window open and two fans going to quell the heat, which didn’t even make a difference. Another student said that during our initial polling, their heat was broken and has been broken through the winter. That same student then followed up during the secondary polling confirming that they were still without heat.
In terms of the classrooms, the results were much the same as the dorms. In our initial polling, 92% of people said their classrooms were too hot, 7% said they were just right and 1% percent said they were cold. In our second round our results were very similar, as 81% stated the classrooms were too hot, 16% said they were just right and 3% said they were too cold.
One student reached out expressing particular concern about the classroom in Crounse that they tutored in. They said the classroom was uncomfortably hot to the point that some students would leave tutoring specifically because of the heat. They also commented that having to worry about extreme temperatures indoors is the last thing people want to worry about at a demanding school like Centre. The fact that this problem is discouraging students from taking advantage of tutoring resources is very concerning.
In some of my classes, both the students and teachers have been complaining about the heat in the classroom. But beyond that, excessively hot temperatures also just creates an uncomfortable living space. The college is responsible for all the facilities on campus and maintaining them in a way to maximize student health and comfort. Students should feel comfortable in their dorm without having to fruitlessly open windows and turn on fans, which can even be dangerous for first floor dorms.
I understand the struggles that come with getting the buildings to the right temperature during a time when the weather is fickle and constantly changing. Along with that, the boiler system in many of Centre’s buildings is not necessarily flexible, which means that it may not be possible to make rapid adjustments with inconsistent weather. However, it is still the case that this is a consistent issue for students, and that’s important to acknowledge. Having temperatures being too hot in dorms can affect students’ ability to sleep (which is very important, especially for college students) and, as previously discussed, ability to focus in a more academic setting.
Once again, I understand the difficulties in creating a comfortable environment that is consistent across all buildings. Nonetheless, I would strongly ask and encourage the college to put more of an effort into maintaining these systems. I know so many people who complain about their AC and heat not working in the dorm no matter what they change the settings to. Making sure that basic systems like these work consistently across all dorms can go a long way to making students feel both more comfortable and like the college truly cares about doing their best to provide a good experience and livelihood. Ideally, the college could utilize a system that can be more reactive to the changing seasons, as the date that the college may expect to switch from heating to cooling may not line up with what the weather has in mind. While this is the ideal scenario, at the very least I think that the student body would appreciate systems that are better maintained so they do not have to worry if the AC/heating in their dorms will be working or not.