Students living in the College’s newest residence hall have raised concerns about the cleanliness of shared bathrooms, lack of accessible cleaning supplies, and the uneven burden placed on residents to maintain communal spaces.
At a recent Student Government Association (SGA) meeting on Nov. 3, student representatives described bathrooms that had become increasingly unsanitary since the residence hall opened in September. They also questioned whether the College’s current expectations for residents adequately account for the building’s layout and the number of students sharing its facilities.
Ava Wu, Class of `28 SGA Senator and Community Advisor (CA), said complaints had resurfaced after a relatively quiet period at the beginning of the semester.
“Recently, I, like, hadn’t heard much from residents for, like, a few months from… September until very recently, and then, like, it all hit me again with residents talking to me about… how disgusting the bathrooms were,” Wu said.
Wu described the condition of some bathrooms, saying, “There’s just like bodily fluids in places that shouldn’t be.”
The concerns have been particularly pronounced in the building’s shared bathroom areas. Community Advisors have attempted to address the issue by creating group chats and organizing weekly bathroom-cleaning sign-up sheets. However, students said participation has been inconsistent.
“An issue that we’re facing is literally just that people don’t care,” Wu added.
Students also raised concerns about the unequal responsibility placed on residents who have accessibility needs or medical circumstances that make cleaning more difficult. Wu described how the burden of maintaining a shared bathroom can fall disproportionately on an individual resident.
“Then it just, like, all of that burden goes onto her, and she has to clean the space. It’s just unfair,” Wu said.
One proposed solution was to change the building’s housing arrangements by converting some of the open clusters into suites. Students suggested that a more clearly defined suite structure could help establish responsibility among smaller groups of residents and make bathroom maintenance more manageable.
Gustavo Burkett, Dean of the College, acknowledged that the building’s design has presented challenges that administrators did not fully anticipate.
“This building, it’s a big experiment in a way, because with every new building, you design a space, thinking that people are gonna use it in a particular way, and then the first year [of students residing in the building] people use it in a totally different way,” Burkett said.
Burkett said the College could consider whether some spaces, particularly on the first floor, could be reconfigured. However, no changes were finalized at the meeting.
A central point of disagreement concerns how the College classifies the bathrooms. Under the current arrangement, bathrooms in the building’s open clusters are considered suite bathrooms, meaning residents are expected to maintain them rather than rely on regular custodial cleaning.
Burkett suggested that the College may need to reconsider the terminology used to describe the different living arrangements. “I think what we need to do here is try to change how we label these places,” he said, adding that the distinction between clusters and suites should be clearer.
Burkett also discussed the possibility of dedicating one day of custodial work each week to the new residence hall’s bathrooms. The proposal would involve reallocating cleaning time from other residence halls.
“Let’s cut one day of cleaning from every other residence hall on campus,” Burkett said. “And then that day of the week, we dedicate it to move all the Facilities team.”
The proposal was presented as a possibility rather than an approved change. Burkett also cited staffing shortages in Facilities, noting that the department had approximately 25 open positions at the time, although he did not have an updated figure.
Beyond custodial services, students emphasized that residents need better access to basic cleaning supplies. They described difficulties obtaining paper towels, gloves, disinfectant, and other materials, particularly for students without cars or other reliable means of transportation.
Peter Ryan `27, a student representative, recounted an incident in which another resident needed supplies after someone vomited but could not easily obtain them. “They came to me in the hallway,” Ryan said. “I didn’t know the person, and I, like, don’t have a car to get paper towels.”
Ryan argued that providing residents with basic supplies could help address immediate sanitation concerns, even if regular custodial cleaning is not possible. “Even if for now, we can’t get cleaning staff inside the buildings to help and clean, just giving people things like paper towels, soap, and that sort of stuff, and setting some money aside, especially for students who don’t have vehicles or the means to access them, would be really beneficial,” Ryan added.
Burkett discussed the possibility of placing basic cleaning kits under bathroom sinks and providing safer cleaning products. He noted that Facilities has concerns about chemical safety when distributing cleaning materials to students. He also said the Housing budget is slightly more than $400,000 annually, covering expenses including CA compensation and staffing.
Students additionally suggested creating a hall council, modeled after councils in other residential communities, to establish a more consistent channel of communication between residents and Housing.
“I think there’s a lot of space for improvement and I think the residents have a lot of great ideas about that, like, housing just isn’t hearing yet,” Wu said.
The discussion reflected a broader challenge for the College as it adjusts to the first year of occupancy in a newly designed residential space. While the building’s layout was intended to encourage community and shared responsibility, students said the current cleaning expectations have not consistently translated into clean or accessible facilities.
For now, the College has discussed several possible responses, including changes to custodial scheduling, cleaning supplies, and the classification of residential spaces. None of those proposals had been finalized at the meeting.
The question remains how the College will balance its expectations for student responsibility with residents’ concerns about sanitation, accessibility, and the maintenance of shared living spaces.
~ Mia Dinunzio `28
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