Views On Vassar | Quiet corridors a haven for noisemakers

Tendai Musakwa Opinions Editor

The Black Eyed Peas’ song “Pump It” reverberates across the floor at 11:30 p.m., interspersed with loud shouts and the rhythmic creaking of a squeaky bed. This is a typical scenario on a Friday night at any college, one might say. Regrettably, this is not the archetypal floor at a college—this is the second floor of Noyes, a floor which the College designated a quiet corridor. Quiet corridors are halls on which no noise is supposed to be heard outside anyone’s room and parties are not allowed. Currently, not all Quiet Corridors are serving their intended purpose and should be closely examined in order to determine whether they are necessary at all.

Quiet Corridors were established to provide a conducive studying or resting environment for students who expressed their interest in living in such an environment. As such, one would expect that the freshmen students in Quiet Corridors would be those who have elected this option. However, this is not the case. For example, on the second floor of Noyes, of 19 freshmen questioned, only ten wanted to be on a quiet corridor.

Kelly Simms ’10, a resident of this quiet floor, said, “I think [the hallway is] generally quite loud, with yelling and noise from people’s music.” This sentiment, shared by many other respondents shows that noise is a large problem even on Quiet Corridors.

One might also suppose that Quiet Corridors are superfluous since certain quiet hours are supposed to be maintained at the College regardless of whether the hall is specifically designated as quiet or not.
The residential policy of the College states, “Reasonable quiet should be maintained in the houses and on the campus at all times…Quiet must be maintained between the hours of 11 p.m. and 10 a.m., Sunday to Thursday, and 2 a.m. to 12 p.m., Friday and Saturday.”

As affirmed by the College’s residential policy, a reasonable amount of quiet should be maintained on all corridors—which means that there should be no need for quiet corridors if all students strictly adhere to the College’s residential life policy.

Resident of Raymond house Katie Mae Unruhe ’08 said, “Noise is really not bad; House Fellows have never come down to complain because of noise.”

Nevertheless, it can still be maintained that quiet corridors are necessary for the comfort of the College’s staff that also live in dorms with students. However, these corridors currently simply do not satisfy this need. Ana Droscoski and Anthony Brown are House Fellows in Noyes directly below a quiet corridor. Droscoski said, “We’ve had some noise issues. It is reasonable to expect noise during hours like 8 p.m. or 9 p.m., but it would be nice if we could have some peace and quiet at midnight.”

To rectify the inconsistencies, perhaps the Office of Residential Life should adhere more closely to the preferences of freshmen students as indicated on the housing preference forms when allocating rooms to freshmen.
Another solution would be to more strictly implement the current Residential Life policy, possibly through noise monitoring by Security or Student/House Fellows, and eliminating superfluous Quiet Corridors. Noise monitoring would be tiresome though, and might have a detrimental affect on the dynamic between Student Fellows and their peers.

But perhaps the most feasible solution would be the simplest as well: All students ought to stay conscious of the fact that they are living in a community and thus should practice self-restraint (regardless of whether they live on Quiet Corridors or not) in order to make the College a more comfortable, slightly quieter place for all residents.