Gregory Hall Needs An Upgrade, Residents Agree
If you’re lucky enough to reside in a campus building like Nollen Hall, you are blessed with their communal kitchen. Inside its refrigerator, stretching 5 ½ feet tall, are the usual suspects: eggs, soups, sauces, veggies and a bottle of kvass.
Nollen’s kitchen allows its residents to store this drink, as well as any other food and beverage. Such convenience isn’t the case for everyone living on South Campus.
One resident of Gregory Hall, Senegalian sophomore Juliette Ndao, wants a taste of home. She was hoping to cook a childhood favorite of hers: fataya, a deep-fried, savory pastry. But, she’s unable to.
“I miss [fataya] a lot, but I can’t cook here because, no kitchens,” Ndao said. “I don’t want to walk all the way to Nollen or McClure to be able to cook.”
Then, there’s Tessa Palermo, a first-year Gregory resident, who just wanted to bake some cookies with her friends.
“We had to go with our friend who lives in Nollen…to just make cookies,” Palermo said.
Other residents, as well as Palermo, speak about the inconvenience of no building-wide air conditioning.
“We need A/C,” first-year Omarie Burns said. “I tried to get multiple fans because of how hot it was.”
Burns would go on to say that all of his roommates have their own fans as well.
Additionally, in a poll of 50 Gregory Hall residents and RAs, the most-wanted amenity was a kitchen, earning 40% of the votes, 46% if the votes for a communal microwave are included. The second most-wanted amenity was air conditioning at 28%.
If it wasn’t clear enough, Gregory Hall is hardly the most ideal residential building on South Campus due to poor-quality or lacking amenities. Even the lounge, one of only very few conveniences, has faulty air conditioning, an unusable microwave, and a broken TV.
Even worse two of the four available dryers became unusable for an entire week in November. On Yik Yak, one user complained about the inconvenience, writing, “[The] right side of Gregory has some sick and twisted animals.” Another user commented, “This sh*t is going to make me absolutely lose it, dude.”
My own experiences are similar. Before purchasing a box fan, I slept in my car the first night on campus because I couldn’t fall asleep in the heat. Working one’s way around these problems isn’t just a choice; it’s a necessity.
Even residence assistants are inconvenienced.
“During one of my social events, I had to use my own projector instead of the TV, because the TV is broken,” sophomore and RA Jailia Phillips said. “I had to be creative for my movie night, I had to cover the lights with paper…I did what I had to do.”
Fortunately, action can be taken to persuade the College higher-ups to develop new amenities.
“The clearest path would maybe be, go through your RA…and then the RA can then turn to their [residence director],” Phillips said. “Their RD would have to make sure it’s a part of the budget and make sure that there’s any avenues to get it.”
Additionally, Dean of Students and Assistant Vice President of Student Affairs Tony Tyler suggests an alternative way to advocate for large-scale, costly changes, like adding communal air conditioning or a kitchen: speak to Student Government.
“Talk to your senator,” Tyler said. “They’re [the] representative voice for students on campus. [Requests] are given some weight when Student Government wants to do something…like, the body has spoken.”
Not to mention, upon learning of the current state of Gregory Hall’s amenities on Nov. 12, Tyler expressed his annoyance with how nothing was being done for certain small repairs and additions. He would email me, writing, “I’ll be getting you all a microwave for the lobby and getting a TV ASAP.” A communal microwave was added the following weekend.
Speak to your residence hall higher-ups. Speak to the people at Van Ness, like Tyler. Speak to Student Government. Everyone should be able to have a taste of home, to relax in cool temperatures, to watch TV on the couch, and all from the comfort of one’s residence hall. Otherwise, “ghetto Gregory” will never change.