A flood started on the third floor of the Binford hall. Water leaked from the third floor all the way down to the first, affecting several rooms. Students are upset because many of their belongings were destroyed. The Guilford staff should have prevented this incident. This was not the first time there was water leakage. If the problem had been taken care of properly the first time, and the pipes fully replaced, this never would have occurred. It angers me that the school can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to build a new community center and not spare enough to fix a much less expensive problem, which has the potential to reoccur.

Joshua Payne, a first-year student living on the third floor, was at a basketball game when his roommate called to inform him that their room was flooded. When he returned to Binford, “the floor was soaked and there was an awful stench.”

His books and shoeboxes were ruined, and three pairs of shoes he took very good care of were soaking wet. Luckily, the bookstore replaced his books, and the shoes dried up.

Even so, if I were Payne I would have been furious. I would have gone into campus life and flipped over a table. Especially considering that the school didn’t give them any advice other than to find another place to sleep for the next four days.

Devin Swanson, a first-year student living on the first floor, was the first to discover the leak. He came into his room at about 7:30 p.m. on Saturday to find water leaking from the ceiling. “The light fixture was filling up with water, water and pieces of ceiling were falling from the left corner, and there was basically a waterfall coming from above the window,” Swanson explained. The water ruined some posters, and electronic equipment – such as Swanson’s roommate’s laptop, computer speakers, and iPod – was wet, but seem to be working fine.

Swanson and his roommate called Public Safety a few times; when they got no answer they went to the office and filed a report. His first reaction was angry. He was pretty frustrated that the school let this happen, and especially that their reaction afterwards was so slow.

I completely understand his frustration with this situation. Not only was there no one there to answer their phone calls, when maintenance was informed they reacted very slowly to resolve the situation and adequately accommodate the students. Guilford students pay a lot of money for tuition, and their living situations should be taken into consideration at all times.

“What caused this?” Payne wanted to know. He was shocked at the condition of his room and how the rooms below were also damaged. But, he expressed no anger at the school. “It could have happened to anyone,” said Payne.

These conditions could not possibly be sanitary to live in, and students should be informed of potential risks, and told what to do to protect themselves and their belongings. Children can die from the mildew created from wet carpets. Guilford didn’t have anything to say about this, just some cheap advice to find another place to sleep until the problem is fixed. Sorry, but that doesn’t cut it for me.

Both Payne and Swanson complained of the slow response of maintenance. Because it was Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, the students had no where to stay for three days, and were told to stay in a friends room. This response was irresponsible. What if a student didn’t have a place to stay? This should have been handled better.

The school handled the situation well in most respects. Except that they should have reacted to the situation more promptly. They also should have provided a place to stay for all the students that were affected. The biggest mistake the school made was not taking care of the problem for good, the first time.