As we are all aware, the University of Massachusetts Boston built dorms and for the first time students were able to live on campus. This brings new challenges as well as something else that is new to this school: students staying in the dorms over break. I am one of the students that decided to stay in the dorms for work purposes and it has been an experience. First of all, the whole area around campus was *dead*, and coming back on Christmas night, the only person I spoke to was the police officer who had to sit at the front desk alone. The building was so quiet you could have heard a pen drop from the hallway, and it honestly was a little unnerving.
Students who did stay on campus also found themselves doing something that anyone who has an apartment does: grocery shopping. With the dining hall closed and the UMarket having unknown hours that were impossible to track, we were left to figure out how to feed ourselves like adults. The only downside is that we do not have a stove and we only have an oven; so, the microwave became my BFF over break because I burn anything I put into the oven. Microwaved steamed kale with lemon and sea salt is now my specialty.
The dorms also did not allow guests from Dec. 21, 2018 at 5 p.m. to Jan. 2, 2019 at 9 a.m. This was fine but that time period in the dorms was really lonely and quiet due to the fact that there was not another soul in sight. The bringing of guests then brought on more trouble, but not from the students who were living there. Due to the desks being understaffed and the officers who sit there not being trained to use the system, guests were not being signed out correctly. What happens is a student will sign a guest in while there is someone there who has access to the system. The guest will hand over their ID, and then the student and guest go upstairs. Once the guest is ready to leave, the guest will just be handed their ID and be signed out electronically. But due to under-staffing and the officers not knowing how to use the system, the guests were not being signed out electronically, which counted as an overnight stay. Due to this, I have lost all of my overnight stays, and when I brought it up to housing, I was told that they were going to try to fix it but have not gotten back to me about it yet.
The dorms have been extremely peaceful though, and slowly but surely students are moving back in. The dorms are not as quiet, and the campus is not bare due to winter classes. I would 100 percent stay in the dorms over break again because it is a really cool experience. You can hang out wherever you want in the dorms and nobody else will be there. You can watch what you want on the TV in the lounge, and you get to spend some much-needed quality time with yourself.
