Students are no strangers to complaints. When you live in a dorm, eat at a college dining hall and find outrageously priced tickets slapped on your car windshield every once in awhile, it’s little wonder why it becomes so easy to carp about the university.
But those complaints are rarely heard by anyone other than resident assistants, roommates or Facebook friends. Rarely are they heard by the people who can actually do something about it. However, that wasn’t the case early last week when representatives from Dining Services, Resident Life, Residential Facilities and Transportation Services all showed up for a town hall-style forum sponsored by the Residence Hall Association.
Although all four of the aforementioned departments were present, Dining Services seemed to bear the brunt of complaints. Students, dissatisfied with options in the two university dining halls, raised numerous issues and made suggestions to Bart Hipple, the assistant director for the department.
But what was more surprising about this event was not just that these departments took the time to participate but that they actually seemed to be listening.
Hipple and other representatives for the university’s various departments demonstrated the kind of listening that is often absent from student-administrator interactions. No matter the number of complaints thrown their way, the department representatives seemed to actually digest every word. When one student complained that she was served moldy bread, Hipple promptly expressed shock and voiced his apologies, instead of questioning the student as to the validity of her accusation.
Certainly, these departments have numerous issues. They function as complicated bureaucracies in which student concerns are often lost. Although students simply showing up and taking issue with the quality of food in the dining halls or the convoluted nature of parking lot restrictions doesn’t necessarily equate to change, it does demonstrate an openness to change — which is important.
These departments are specific in their goals: to serve the university community. It is easy for such departments, who see new students come and go every year, to slip into a complacency that breeds an unwillingness to improve. Last week’s forum, however, should give students a bit of hope.
No one expects filet mignon and caviar to begin showing up in the dining halls anytime soon, but the road to improvement is paved with conversations.
Time will tell whether university officials were simply appeasing students or actually registering what they heard to steer their departments in better directions. In any event, the receptive nature of last week’s forum is one that should be more frequently demonstrated by university officials.
Students may grumble about this and that, but that does not mean their complaints lack substance. As the university seeks to improve in a time of immense turnover in leadership positions, student suggestions may be the key to pushing the university further than ever before. University officials just need to listen.
