A topic of concern addressed to UNH Student Body President Jonathan Dean last spring during his presidential campaign was the usage of lounges in residential halls and on-campus apartments as living space.
A resolution to ensure that lounges are not used for residential purposes in the future was proposed on Sunday, Oct. 23 to the Student Senate.
Dean said that there were a number of reasons why this was an issue.
“One, there were certain students who really didn’t like living in lounges, they felt like it was a different experience than living in the room,” Dean said. “Two, this was the more main reason, when you take away lounge space in the resident halls, there’s less room for halls to run their events. It’s also less ability for someone to have a study space and to meet other people in the dorm.”
Once assuming his place in office, Dean and his vice president, Carley Rotenberg, met with Director of Housing Kathy Chesney to express the concern on behalf of the student body.
According to Dean, Chesney said she would do her very best to ensure that it wouldn’t be necessary for students to live in built-up lounges for the 2016-17 academic year.
Dean noted, with a positive sense of attitude, that there are currently only two Congreve Hall single lounges being used to house students. “[The lounges] are basically almost rooms anyways,” Dean said in regard to the two Congreve lounges.
Dean said that the main reason for the minimal usage of lounges in lodging purposes was due to UNH Housing putting a conscious effort into ensuring that there were other options for student accommodation.
Further on the topic, Dean mentioned that this is primarily only an issue that arises in the fall semester since there are many students who make the choice to move off campus in the spring semester.
Also during Sunday’s Student Senate meeting, Director of Campus Recreation Stacey Hall came to talk on the topic of potentially allocating funds from students’ fees to pay for matters concerning the public Outdoor Pool. Before the pool’s construction, Student Senate passed a resolution in fall 2013, which established that no money from student fees would go toward the funding of the pool.
Dean said that Campus Recreation is currently looking at different options on the matter, but since the pool was opened in August, approximately 4,000 students made use of it.