Anna Hsia
The Terrace Complex once served as the original university building, now comprises three residence halls: Brute Hall, DuBois Hall and McCaffrey Hall. While these buildings have been renovated, issues unfortunately still arise.
It is a week before the Spring semester starts, and in the middle of the night, the fire alarms in Terrace go off. Everyone evacuated the building safely, but there was no visible sight or smell of smoke.
Later, we learned that a hot water pipe burst, flooding the first and second-floor floor suites of DuBois. The hot water caused significant damage to personal belongings, ruined ceiling tiles, caused paint to flake and windows to expand making it impossible to open.
The residents were notified later in the morning and informed that they would be moved into temporary housing in other dormitory locations around campus. Items such as clothing and bedding that faced damaged would be cleaned and returned to them.
As a Resident Assistant on campus, I felt so horrible, because this directly impacted some of my residents. It was heartbreaking to see them dealing with the loss of their belongings. Some of the items held sentimental value while other things were gifted to them, and even their everyday necessities could not be easily replaced.
When I got the chance to speak to my residents for the first time, I asked if they would receive compensation for any of the damages. This was my first time experiencing an issue of this scale, and I honestly had no idea how this process would work. It was shocking when my residents told me that the only support, they received was laundry service. Among this, instead of having their belongings cleaned and delivered to their new temporary housing, the laundry was left in large trash bags in the hallways outside their suite.
According to the Student Code of Conduct, it states that the university is not responsible for the loss or damage of personal property of residents and residents are advised to carry personal property insurance. This means the university recommends that the student, on top of paying room and board, wants them to also get renter insurance for instances like this. Personally, that is insane. Why is insurance not included as part of our housing?
While I understand it is not the university’s responsibility to replace damaged items, I believe they could have done something to show they care and acknowledge the severity of the issue.
When I asked my supervisor, the Graduate Hall Coordinator for the Terrace Complex, about the cause of the pipe burst, they stated that they were unsure.
They told me that their communications are only focused on the repair and reconstruction of the area and not the initial cause of the problem. They also mentioned that only Campus Environment knows the reason behind the pipe burst.
To me, it seems unusual and even concerning that my supervisor was not informed about the cause of the pipe issue.
This issue is still ongoing, but I think it highlights the imperfections in how the university handled this situation and the need for better support in the future for students who are impacted by something that is out of their control.
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