Scattered across the Charles River Campus, Boston University students call brownstones and high rises home, but one expensive ritual unites them all – often in anger: doing laundry.
Whether it’s at Myles Standish Hall, Warren Towers or 575 Commonwealth Ave., students said they regard overflowing hampers with dread because coin machines or card scanners do not always work and it’s nearly a rule that a washer or dryer won’t be working on a given day.
College of Arts and Sciences freshman Sena Cetin said the machines are often broken, and she ends up using her ID to pay for laundry with Convenience Points, instead of quarters.
Other universities, including Wheaton College and Ithaca College, have simplified the weekly process by including laundry fees in room and board costs, Wheaton College Director of Business Services John Sullivan said. By paying a flat fee, students can do their laundry without worrying about broken coin slots or card readers.
Wheaton changed its on-campus laundry service last year when its contract was up for renewal, Sullivan said. Wheaton also replaced its old machines with newer, more energy-efficient models, saving money overall.
“It’s awesome,” Mollie Denhard, a Wheaton sophomore, said. “It’s definitely easier to not have to search for money and all that stuff. At least if the dryers don’t dry, you can put it in again instead of having a pile of sopping wet clothes to dry in your room.”
Wheaton students must pay a mandatory $75 laundry fee as part of housing costs and the new system saves money, Sullivan said.
Ithaca College’s revamped “free play” system also incorporates the Internet, Ithaca Operations and Office of Residence Life Assistant Director Zachariah Newswanger said. The website informs students via text message or email about washer and dryer availability and when their loads are finished.
“It’s convenient, one less thing to worry about,” Ithaca College freshman Maria Winters DiMarco said. “I would probably wait until I got home a lot more, and I really would not want to pay if we had to use quarters.”
Two years ago, the State University of New York at Albany joined the “flat-rate” laundry movement with 14 other SUNY schools by adding use fees to housing and tuition, University Auxiliary Services Associate Executive Director Tiziana Rota said.
“The students were excited and thrilled because they don’t have to remember to carry coins and cards,” she said. “The university was very satisfied because it reduced energy costs. The goal was to provide amenity, to increase the level of student satisfaction with the overall quality of life, and I think we have achieved that goal.”
Webb Lancaster, BU Auxiliary Services Department director of operations, said in an email that BU will not change its laundry plan because the current system is best for a large university setting. He said students spend 20 percent less annually with BU’s voluntary laundry policy than Ithaca students who must pay an extra $90 on top of school fees.
Because some BU students bring their laundry home on weekends, Lancaster said the voluntary policy keeps them from paying extra for facilities they would not use.
BU’s policy is environmentally friendly because students are more conservative machine users, he said. Energy efficient washers and dryers were installed in 1991, and “additional upgrades” were made in the laundry rooms in 2001, Lancaster said.
Auxiliary Services is reviewing feedback from LaundryAlert, a system at the 1019 laundry room that notifies students when machines are available. If successful, Lancaster said they would like to expand the programs to more BU laundry rooms.
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