Students who live in residential housing and use on-campus laundry rooms now have the ability to swipe in all hours of the day.
Starting this semester, laundry facilities in Treudley Hall, Gamertsfelder Hall and Dougan House require swipe access, which means students who live on campus can use the facilities before 8 a.m. and after midnight.
That is a change from last semester, when the laundry facilities were open from 8 a.m. until midnight and were unlocked for both on- and off-campus students during that period.
Swipe-in access allows the laundry rooms to be open 24/7 with more security as non-residents will not be able to swipe in, Ariann Lane, vice commissioner of Residence Life on Student Senate, said.
“I am currently a resident on West Green and had been hearing from other residents their want for this change,” Lane said in an email. “I thought it seemed easy enough and took it to the Res Life Commission for consideration.”
With the change in effect, the laundry rooms are more secure, Lane said.
“The Student Senate Residence Life commission reached out to me with an interest in expanding the hours of our laundry centers to 24 hours and also requested that the centers be locked for the exclusive use of residence hall students,” Pete Trentacoste, executive director of Housing and Residence Life, said in an email.
Trentacoste added that members of the Housing & Residence Life staff approved the change due to the expanded service and security for the laundry centers.
This change only affects those who use those three laundry facilities — the rest of the laundry facilities were already open 24/7 to students. The upgrades did not cost Housing and Residence Life, Lane said.
“This change keeps the campus property more secure, and it makes me feel more at ease of leaving my clothes there for hours whilst doing my laundry, seeing as that it protects the room from non-student people who may put my and other's clothes at risk for thievery,” Andrea McGannon, a freshman studying biological sciences pre-professional, said.
Although the locks keep non-residents out, Housing and Residence Life does not believe that non-residents were using the facilities. The swipe-in points were added as an extra precaution, Lane said.
While custodians used the time when the laundry rooms were closed to clean them, the change has not affected their routine time to go in and clean, Trentacoste said.
