As of May 24, 2021 masks will no longer be required at University of Utah facilities following state legislation banning face mask requirements. Masks are still required in U Health facilities and on-campus buses and shuttles.

“All job-related personal protective equipment (PPE) safety requirements will continue to be enforced consistent with federal regulations and best practices for worker safety,” said Chris Nelson, the U communications director, in an email interview.

The statement released by U communications still encourages students to get vaccinated, highlighting the free, weekly asymptomatic coronavirus testing and vaccination clinic that will continue on campus throughout the summer.

“Regardless of what someone chooses (mask or no mask), the university seeks to foster a sense of community and asks everyone on campus to be respectful of individual decisions on mask wearing,” the statement reads.

Additionally, according to a recent survey of faculty and students, 90% of respondents have been vaccinated or plan to be vaccinated in the coming weeks.

The campus-wide policy change came after the CDC updated its guidelines to say fully vaccinated individuals can resume activities without wearing a mask or physically distancing themselves.

The U’s new policy is in accordance with state legislation H.B. 1007, a bill prohibiting Utah schools from requiring face masks. On Wednesday, May 19 the bill passed in both the House and Senate. Gov. Spencer J. Cox called state legislators to meet in a special session to discuss 22 issues — one of them being the prohibition of face mask requirements.

Some against the bill said it may be too early to ban mask mandates, and the potential for future outbreaks should be considered. However, the bill does not prevent schools from working with local health departments if future outbreaks do occur.

Additionally, some legislators disagreed with the premise of the state setting health standards for local school districts.

Rep. Val Peterson, a sponsor of the bill, hopes its passage will assure parents and students they will return to a normal situation in Fall 2021.

k.silverstein@dailyutahchronicle.com 

@chronykayleigh

The post Face Masks No Longer Required on the U’s Campus appeared first on The Daily Utah Chronicle.

Free, Virtual Event is Biggest Premed Event in the World

Boulder, Colorado. May 24th, 2021. Mappd has opened registration for National Premed Day, enabling premedical students to attend a free virtual conference to better prepare themselves for medical school.

National Premed Day is an annual holiday created by Mappd, LLC. National Premed Day is on Friday, May 28th, 2021. The date, 5/28, is a reference to the number “528” which is a perfect score on the Medical College Admissions Test (MCAT®). The MCAT® is a required exam that most premedical students take in the year before applying to medical school.

With 10,000+ Premeds in attendance in 2020, its inaugural year, National Premed Day has become the biggest premedical student event in the world. In 2021, the event includes 1 day of live streaming, with 4 tracks of topics, and 35 speakers from throughout the medical community.

“National Premed Day is something that I’ve wanted to do for a long time,” said Dr. Ryan Gray, Mappd CEO. “I started National Premed Day to bring the best minds in the premed world together to help students navigate their journey to med school.”

Premedical students, as well as their families and advisors, are all welcome to attend. Registration is open now at https://nationalpremedday.com/

Company information. Mappd, LLC was founded in 2019 by premedical process experts Rachel Grubbs and Dr. Ryan Gray. Mappd is best known for its eponymous software solution, a platform that premeds use throughout their premed years to track progress as they navigate the road to med school. Mappd also offers 1-on-1 advising services. In addition to the free virtual event National Premed Day, Mappd offers premeds hundreds of hours of free information via its YouTube channel.

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For more information, press only: Rachel Grubbs | 614.568.3101 | rachel@mappd.com
For more information about National Premed Day: https://nationalpremedday.com/
For more information about Mappd, LLC: https://mappd.com/about

Cal Falcons chicks’ names honor COVID-19 pandemic hero and Indigenous tradition

Sean Peterson/Courtesy

Cal Falcons used a voting process to name UC Berkeley’s resident falcon chicks. The chicks have been named Fauci, Wek’-Wek’ and Kaknu.

UC Berkeley’s resident falcon chicks have been named Fauci, Wek’-Wek’ and Kaknu following a voting process run by Cal Falcons with public submissions, polling and creative suggestions from Berkeley children.

The final round of voting for names included 15 options from four different groups, including submissions from Berkeley children, local park names, COVID-19 pandemic heroes and Indigenous names. Fauci, Wek’-Wek’ and Kaknu were the three choices with the most votes, with one bird’s name honoring Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical advisor to the president, and two birds named after Miwok and Ohlone tribal lores.

“We reached out to the Miwok and Ohlone tribal leaders about the names Kaknu and Wek’-Wek’, but didn’t hear back,” said Sean Peterson, a campus Ph.D. student who managed the falcon naming process, in an email. “We want to make sure we’re as respectful as possible to their culture and traditions, especially considering UC Berkeley sits on unceded Ohlone land.”

The selection process took place across various social media platforms where Peterson and biologist Lynn Schofield, both of whom are Cal Falcons social media managers, collected 650 suggestions from the community and asked people to pick their favorites. The two also partnered with the Berkeley Public Library to give local kids the opportunity to pitch ideas, according to Peterson.

Cal Falcons wanted to make sure the names were appropriate and “non-divisive,” Peterson added in the email. He said there was a lot of support for naming the birds Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson-Johnson, after the three pharmaceutical companies that produced major COVID-19 vaccines.

Cal Falcons removed those names, however, citing the companies’ historically unethical practices. Peterson added that a similar situation occurred last year when they changed the name of one falcon, Bancroft, when it came to light that Hubert Howe Bancroft, a prominent ethnologist, produced “horribly racist” writings.

“Considering the past actions of some of those companies (e.g., Johnson and Johnson has been implicated in the opioid crisis and Pfizer has performed illegal medical trials on African children), we didn’t feel it was right to honor these birds with corporate names,” Peterson said in an email.

The chicks are differentiated using colored bands with specific codes: red is for Fauci, blue is for Wek’-Wek’ and yellow is for Kaknu, according to the Cal Falcons website. Schofield said usually they are able to tell chicks apart by size or sex, but since the chicks are all male, the tags are the only way to identify them until they grow their outer feathers.

Schofield added that naming the birds is mostly for the community — specifically people who have developed an interest in keeping tabs on the birds. She said the bands are for science, but the names are for people.

“The chicks are likely to fledge this week (probably Thursday/Friday/Saturday), so keep an eye on the cameras as they fly for the first time,” Peterson said in an email.

Contact Matt Brown at mattbrown@dailycal.org and follow him on Twitter at @maattttbrown .

The Daily Californian

Almost a third of total students — 31.1 percent — and 44.7 percent of employees have documented their COVID-19 vaccinations with the University as of May 21, according to Executive Vice President for Planning and Policy Russell Carey ’91 MA’06.

Of the students currently on campus, 44.6 percent have uploaded their vaccine cards and 47.1 percent of on-campus employees have documented theirs. But, Carey added, “we expect that many more people are vaccinated than (those who) have just uploaded their cards.”

President Christina Paxson P’19 announced in an email Thursday that all on-campus community members must be vaccinated by July 1 unless they have medical or religious exemptions under applicable law, The Herald previously reported.

The University moved up the vaccination deadline because the vaccine supply has increased since early April, when Brown first announced that all students and faculty were required to be vaccinated to return for the fall semester, Carey said. “At that time, the eligibility and access to vaccines particularly (for) college-aged students was very low, and it wasn’t clear when it would become more available.”

“That’s changed dramatically. Anyone connected with the Brown community can get a vaccine readily, and we felt that that July 1 deadline was realistic,” Carey said, adding that “we really want to underscore the importance of getting vaccinated and the importance of documenting it because that’s the key (to) returning to more normal operations.”

Once the University receives documentation of  “near-universal vaccination levels, which we think we can do very quickly,” Carey said, “we can make changes more broadly” to University COVID-19 guidelines.

COVID-19 rates have remained low on campus since students’ arrival for the summer term and with hybrid and in-person classes having started May 19, Carey said.

During Quiet Period from May 9 to 15, two employees tested positive for COVID-19, according to Carey. Following the shortened Quiet Period, one University community member, a student, tested positive for COVID-19 through the asymptomatic testing program as of May 22, according to the Healthy Brown COVID-19 Dashboard. Over the past four weeks, there have been a total of three confirmed positive student cases, Carey said. 

During this period of “in and out” with students moving out of campus and returning after the two-week break between the spring and summer terms, “we had very low levels of positivity in general, and very low among students,” Carey said.

While students and faculty currently on campus must continue getting tested twice per week through the University’s asymptomatic testing program, Carey noted that Brown is “certainly hoping to reduce testing frequency” and will have “more information about testing frequency soon.”

The University is actively working on revising the campus safety policy and allowing increasing levels of activity on campus, Carey said. “We’re in this transition period … where people can already do more and more things but still have to exercise a level of caution,” he said. 

Despite the low number of COVID-19 cases on campus, an area of concern is the potential impacts of virus variants, Carey said. The ongoing severity of the pandemic in other countries demonstrates the virus’ ability to “mutate” and “have impacts that people don’t necessarily expect.”

“I think that continued vigilance about basics, like hand washing and staying home if you’re sick and social distancing, even as that starts to diminish, are going to be really important,” Carey said. “We’re probably just like everybody else, cautiously optimistic.”

The University’s dual role as an employer and a residential community may make campus guidance and policies appear more restrictive than the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s or the Rhode Island Department of Health’s recommendations, Carey said. 

Currently, RIDOH recommends that fully vaccinated individuals wear masks in businesses that require them, public transportation, prisons and correctional facilities among few other areas. For others, they recommend continued mask wearing indoors and within three feet of others outside.

“We are moving in the same directions; we just may not all move at the same pace,” Carey said.

In the last year the world has witnessed some iconic break-ups. Meghan Markle and Price Harry split from the royal family, Kim Kardashian and Kanye West announced their divorce, and now Microsoft’s co-founder Bill Gates has stated that he and his wife are planning to go their separate ways. The tech founder released the statement in a Twitter post, stating:

“After a great deal of thought and a lot of work on our relationship, we have made the decision to end our marriage.”

Gates followed this statement by assuring readers that they planned to continue to work together in their shared projects and philanthropic endeavours, which include ‘The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’, a charity which tackles global poverty and disease.

Though he left Microsoft in 2020, to focus his efforts into philanthropy, he still owns a 1.3% share in the company. There has been concern that Gates’ association with Microsoft could have an effect on the company’s stocks, since the market is highly volatile and easily influenced by external factors. If you’re wondering how to trade stocks online after the announcement and are concerned about your own investment in the leading tech company, then this article should hopefully put you at ease.

The computing couple’s history at Microsoft

According to Forbes’ list of The Richest People in the World, Bill Gates ranks fourth, with a net worth of $124 billion, the majority of which can be attributed to his founding role at Microsoft and role as CEO until 2000. Bill met his wife Melinda at Microsoft, where she started out as a product manager and eventually climbed the ladder to become the company’s general manager of information products.

The couple went on to set up their foundation in 2000 and have been involved in a multitude of charitable efforts worldwide, including working with researchers and producers to help with COVID-19 treatments and vaccines. In total, their charity has contributed $1.75 billion to this cause. Much of the reason that the pair stepped away from their roles at Microsoft was to focus more closely on their charitable work, which also includes environmental activism.

Key factors that affect stocks

There are a multitude of fundamental factors that can affect a company’s stock prices, which include:

• Dividends announcements
• The obtainment of a substantial new contract
• Scandals released in the news
• The reports of earnings, profits and predicted earnings for the future
• Layoffs of employees
• A change of management
• New product releases or product recalls

The stock market is highly volatile and prices are always fluctuating. Since there are so many factors out of your control that can affect the market, it’s important that you develop a cohesive strategy and plan to stay one step ahead of price movements, so that you can safeguard your profits. There are a variety of risk management tools online, such as a Stop Loss and Stop Limit, to reduce the risk of making substantial losses.

Is Microsoft stock a good investment right now?

Microsoft stock (MSFT) is not a good buy right now, but that has nothing to do with the Gates’ breakup. The news has caused people to speculate on the couple’s relationship and is a shocking revelation, but this has not impacted the price of the stock. This is because the separating couple no longer have any involvement in the company — other than the personal shares that they own.

The fact that Microsoft is not investable at the moment has to do with the fact that it does not provide prospective investors with an attractive entry point. When looking to open a position you should aim to purchase at a rate that is as close as possible to the actual buy point. At the time of writing, MSFT does not fall in the elusive 5% buy zone and therefore is not a prime stock to purchase.

The post How will the divorce of Microsoft’s co-founder affect its stocks? appeared first on The Emory Wheel.

The 11-day period of violence heightened antisemitism, Islamophobia and division in the region.

Gallery|5 Photos

Natalie Colby

290 flags placed in the Gallivan Center in Salt Lake City on May 22, 2021 to commemorate the recent lives lost in Palestine and Colombia. Each flag has the name of a person killed on it and were placed by protesters, 248 flags for Gazans and 42 for Colombians. (Photo by Natalie Colby | Daily Utah Chronicle)

Muna Omar sat in the bed of a light blue truck driving through the streets of downtown Salt Lake City, breaking up the red, black, white and green colors of the Palestinian flag covering much of the crowd. Through a megaphone, she led the several hundred people marching behind her in chants of “Viva, Viva Palestina” and “Free, Free Colombia,” as part of a rally on Saturday, May 22. 

The event, Standing in Solidarity with Palestine and Colombia, was hosted by the Party for Socialism and Liberation, the ANSWER Coalition, and Omar with the intent to bring light to issues happening in both countries. 

Over 200 people have died — most of which are Palestinians killed by Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip — as a result of fighting between Israel and Palestine since May 10. This is part of an ongoing dispute over territory escalated once again when Israeli forces raided Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem on April 13, the first day of Ramadan. According to USA Today, the fighting is the most brutal it’s been in years.

On Friday, May 21 a cease-fire between Israel and the Palestine militant group Hamas was enacted. However, many protesters and speakers said the struggle continues. 

“The world has let us down time and time again,” said Noor, a Palestinian University of Utah senior studying biology and chemistry, who wanted to keep her last name anonymous. “Growing up, I wished someone would come and save us. At the age of 13, I realized it was up to us to save ourselves.”

Noor told the crowd who held Palestinian and Colombian flags that when Israel displaced their grandparents, they failed to consider the grandchildren who would continue to fight for human rights. 

“For the past 73 years, the world has excused our genocide, only reporting when we fought back, when we resisted. This was to manipulate us into looking like terrorists, to demonize us,” she said. 

Additionally, organizers continually highlighted similarities in the struggles for Palestinian and Colombian liberation. 

Colombians began protesting after President Iván Duque Márquez proposed a plan to raise taxes on everyday goods and services. The demonstrations have been consistent since late April and according to the New York Times, “quickly morphed into a widespread expression of anger over poverty and inequality.” More than 40 people have died. 

Devin Martinez, a member of PSL, spoke about the events in Colombia, saying this is the third wave of protests since 2018, when Duque first took office as president. He labeled the Colombian government’s responses as U.S.-funded right-wing violence.

“As a first-generation American, I’m here in front of you today as a result of U.S.-funded violence in Latin America,” Martinez said. “We know that any advancement that the people in Colombia or Palestine get towards their own liberation will bring us that much closer to our liberation here.”

Omar said she continues to plan events like these for her little cousins who were in the crowd. 

“I do this for all the younger generation so they don’t have to grow up as targeted citizens,” Omar said.

The protest started at the Wallace F. Federal building, and after several speakers, the group marched to the Gallivan Center. 

Once protesters reached the Gallivan Center they were handed white and red flags, each with the name of a person killed recently in Palestine and Colombia, 290 total flags. 248 were Gazans and 42 Colombians.

During a moment of silence and prayer, they placed the flags in the grass area.

“Please let’s honor the victims and the martyrs, may they rest in eternal peace. Let us reflect on the lives that they may have lived, or didn’t even get the chance to live,” Omar said. 

Omar emphasized the importance of elevating authentic voices and stories, bringing up friends and family to speak about their experiences under Israeli occupation. As Palestinians, they spoke about their personal experiences in Palestine and their love for the land and people. 

Lina Ghabayen was born in Gaza and spent her first 18 years living there, and said most of what she remembers is after the siege had started. 

“I was defined by the question ‘when will I die?’ Will I die tonight? Will I die tomorrow? When’s the next attack that’s gonna make me one of those deaths?” Ghabayen said. 

She spoke of memories of hiding under the beams of her house in fear her family would be targeted, recalling the destruction of the 2009 and 2012 wars.

“That’s my home, those are our memories, that’s our identity they are trying to get rid of. How many times are we going to go through this situation? How many times are we going to beg to be heard?” Ghabayen said. “It’s ethnic cleansing.” 

Diego Gabriel, a senior studying political science, said he was at the protest to stand in solidarity with his Palestinian and Colombian brothers and sisters. Gabriel said the U can support Palestinians and Colombians by changing curriculum and amplifying their voices. 

“[They should] allow Palestinian voices to be amplified without assuming that it’s antisemitism and not elevating imperialist voices like in their political science department where they prefer to justify American intervention rather than people’s sovereignty,” he said.

After returning to the Wallace F. Federal building, Omar spoke one last time to the remaining crowd.  

“So I’m going to tell you, we appreciate it, but Palestinians don’t want your money, we want the end of Israeli occupation, we want the right to return to a liberated homeland,” Omar said. “Colombians do not want your money, they want the ability to live in a free liberated homeland, away from U.S. control and hegemony.”

k.silverstein@dailyutahchronicle.com

@chronykayleigh

n.colby@dailyutahchronicle.com

@natalie__news

The post ‘Resistance is Justified, When People are Occupied’: Protesters Gather in Support of Colombia and Palestine appeared first on The Daily Utah Chronicle.

Gallery|5 Photos

Natalie Colby

Samantha Douangdara performs traditional Lao folk dance at the AAPI Heritage Month Celebration Rally at Washington Square Park in Salt Lake City on May 22, 2021. (Photo by Natalie Colby | Daily Utah Chronicle)

On Saturday, May 22 members of the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities and others gathered in Washington Square Park to celebrate AAPI Heritage Month at a rally hosted by the Asian American Collegiate Alliance. 

Rosie and Jason Nguyen of ABC4 News emceed the event, introducing speakers and performers in the lineup. Among speakers were several University of Utah students and alumni. 

Lehua Kono, a senior at the U and the president of the Asian American Student Association, said as a person of color at a predominantly white institution, it was difficult to find a community. 

“If I didn’t find AASA, honestly, I probably would not be in the spot I am right now,” Kono said. “So we try and do the same thing for other people — we try and reach out to freshmen as much as possible through whatever platforms we can because we know we can be that community that can support them but also help them navigate college.”

Another U student, Christine Min, recently organized a protest following the 2021 Atlanta spa shootings, a moment that made her realize she had to speak up. She also shared her experience as an Asian American in Utah.

Additionally, ASUU Vice President for University Relations Tiffany Chan spoke at the event and highlighted the story of her Chinese immigrant parents and what it means to be a first-generation college student. 

“My story is about perseverance and about resilience because standing here right now I’m trying to make my parents proud. I’m trying to make their efforts worthwhile,” Chan said. 

In attendance were state Rep. Karen Kwan, state Sen. Jani Iwamoto and Salt Lake City Council Member Darin Mano, three people of color in a predominantly white legislature, who each talked about the lack of AAPI representation in Utah politics. 

“I was the first Asian American woman to be elected in 2008 when I was elected to the Salt Lake County Council, and in 2014 when I was elected to the Utah state senate,” Iwamoto said. “I had to explain what it meant to be an Asian American.”

Mano said Rep. Kwan and Sen. Iwamoto served as his mentors and taught him about being a person of color in politics. 

“As a person of color serving in Utah, you have two constituencies,” Mano said. “I represent my community, the people that vote for me but I also represent the people that look like me.”

Shirley Ann Higuchi, the author of “Setsuko’s Secret,” a novel about Japanese American incarceration, encouraged audience members to visit the Topaz Camp Site in Utah. 

“I urge all of you to study incarceration [and] the effects because you know what, it can happen again, and it will happen again unless we rise together as a community to support each other,” Ann Higuchi said. 

There were also performers from community groups including UT-Arirang, Salt Lake City Ballet Chinese Classical Dancers, Ogden Buddhist Taiko group and Samantha Douangdara, who performed a traditional Lao folk dance. 

U alumni Sara Jones concluded the event by speaking about her experience as a Korean adoptee into a white Utah family and highlighting disparities in Asian representation in leadership positions. 

“May is also mental health awareness month, and it’s important to understand how childhood trauma, loss of culture, racism and discrimination have impacted Asian adoptees,” Jones said. “Transracial adoptees experience anxiety, depression and suicide at four times the rate of the normal population.”

As the month of May comes to a close, those in attendance were urged to continue to support and celebrate the AAPI community. 

“This month is about us, our stories, our history and our future,” Kono said. “Remember to celebrate your identity and community every day, not just during May.”

k.silverstein@dailyutahchronicle.com

@chronykayleigh

n.colby@dailyutahchronicle.com

@natalie__news

The post AAPI Heritage Month Rally Promotes Unity, Community and Celebration appeared first on The Daily Utah Chronicle.

With 48.9% of the total United States population having received at least one vaccination dose and positivity rates decreasing, USC is hoping for a normal return to campus in the fall, Chief Health Officer Dr. Sarah Van Orman said in a student media briefing Friday. However, uncertainty remains around what that full return to campus will look like, including whether or not students will be required to wear masks in communal areas, such as dining halls and classrooms. 

“People want to know, am I going to have to wear the mask … in the dining hall, am I going to have to wear the mask in the classroom,” Van Orman said. “We don’t know exactly yet. Probably not, but there still will be some places where people wear masks.” 

While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently issued guidance that fully vaccinated people do not need to wear masks except where required by federal, state and local laws, including in places such as public transportation and local businesses, Los Angeles County will require masks indoors, citing guidance from state health officials, until June 15. Following current L.A. County guidelines, USC has not lifted the campus mask mandate for vaccinated people. However, once the County changes its restrictions, USC’s guidelines are likely to follow. 

“We always have the option to be more strict than the county and the state. We never have the option to be less strict than the county or the state,” Van Orman said. “Those guidelines are really based on the local conditions. We don’t know for sure, but it’s likely we would follow those. I think mask wearing will be more restricted to certain very high-risk areas.”

Van Orman also said that vaccinations will be required for all students, faculty and staff, barring religious or medical exemptions, once the vaccine receives full approval from the Food and Drug Administration, which will likely occur “as early as the second half of this yearin the late summer or early fall,” according to CNBC. If the vaccines remain at their current emergency use authorization statuses, students will be required to either receiveget vaccinated or decline the vaccine, regardless of medical or religious reasons, Van Orman said. 

“You are required to either be vaccinated or decline, so you can’t just do nothing. You have to go in and complete the active declination form,” Van Orman said. “Right now, it does not have to be a religious exemption. If they move to FDA approval, … our current policy is that [those individuals who have declinations] would be asked to either be get vaccinated at that point or then submit a request to receive a formal medical or religious exemption.”

The University also plans to launch communication efforts to encourage students to get vaccinated and create plans to vaccinate international students who have not received vaccinations in their home countries, Van Orman said. 

To combat vaccine hesitancy among students, Van Orman said the University looks to have meetings with small groups of hesitant students, faculty and staff to address and discuss concerns about the vaccine. They also plan to create individualized outreach for students who are more hesitant to receive the vaccine. 

Van Orman said she hopes that the USC community can achieve a 90% vaccination rate and greatly decrease the odds of community spread. 

“It’s really difficult for a virus to spread if nine out of 10 people it bumps into won’t be impacted by it,” she said. 

Van Orman also emphasized that some are unable to receive the vaccine because of legitimate medical or religious reasons, making vaccine passports — digital or paper proof that someone has been vaccinated — to acquire entry into certain events and buildings on campus unlikely, even after the vaccines are fully approved by the FDA. However, unvaccinated students will be required to be tested frequently. 

“As a university, it’s unlikely we would say you can’t do something unless you’re vaccinated,” Van Orman said. “We want our community to either be fully vaccinated or regularly tested, and if we have a high level of vaccination — 80 to 90% — and those unvaccinated individuals are engaged in regular testing, those two things together really create a very safe environment.”

Even as countries around the world continue to face devastating outbreaks, Van Orman said that USC is “on a cusp of coming back together” as vaccines have proved “stunningly effective and safe.” 

“We’re always glad to talk to people, but these vaccines are looking better and better, which is really very exciting, and we continue to see the absolute devastation that’s been happening in parts of the world where we don’t have good vaccine rates, such as India, and it’s really heartbreaking, so it’s really a great chance for us to get back to normal,” Van Orman said.

The Quad, while brand new, had major flaws. Sydney Rose/The Cougar

The 2020-21 school year opened with a brand new dorm on campus: The Quad.

The Quad was brand new, having tons of amenities like gyms and kitchens. It was also in a desirable location on campus: in between both dining halls. Residents expected the best of the best but instead found bad shower curtains, a confusing laundry system and more.

The Quad, it turns out, was a disappointment.

One thing that bothered residents were the shower curtains first provided to them. 

“The shower curtains were way too short and were causing water puddling and leaks on the floors below” Hotel and Restaurant senior Catherine Campbell said. “We had water coming out of our light fixture from the room above because of the shower issue, and it was never resolved.”

Campbell also said “some people never received trash cans” and that “even with campus approved command strips, the paint chipped like crazy.” Normally, paint chipping isn’t a big deal, but Housing threatens to charge people for wall damage. 

Residents pay top dollar to live on campus. This goes especially for The Quad, which is one of the more expensive dorms at UH. Yet, they still found cheap paint, a lack of trash cans, and water damage from the provided shower curtains. The list of complaints about The Quad goes on.

“The ‘gym’ they have is awful. It’s got two types of machines and no weights.” Biomedical senior  Kelly Graham said.

Another issue she had was “the weird system they implemented for the laundry.” What Graham is referring to is an app that residents were forced to use called CSCPay Mobile. Residents would have to start the laundry machines from their phones and pay for each wash. The strange thing was that the app provided students with money to spend on laundry. So what was the point of making them use the app? It’s just an extra step that doesn’t benefit students or UH. 

Another thing that residents discovered upon moving in was a strange use of space. 

“The shower space is small compared to the big room that it is in” Media production junior Deztiny Wallace says. Both the toilet room and shower room were quite large compared to the space for the toilet and showering. On top of that, there was no storage closet like one might find in Cougar Place, even though there was clearly the space for it.”

It wasn’t all bad of course. Residents liked the courtyard with hammocks, the location, full-size beds and spacious study rooms. Residents like Wallace also appreciated the mail locker system that allowed residents to get their mail at any time. 

However, there were still major issues with The Quad that may have residents questioning if it’s worth the hype or price. 

Overall, The Quad was disappointing. With its price and hype, residents expected more. Hopefully UH Housing will improve on-campus housing in the future. 

Anna Baker is an English senior who can be reached at opinion@thedailycougar.com

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“The Quad was never worth its hype, price” was originally posted on The Cougar