Michelle Hennessy – News Reporter
Southern closes for bad weather more often because of the large number of commuters that makes up the student body, according to Southern’s director of Public Affairs, Patrick Dilger.
“The considerations would be different if you had a higher population of students living on campus probably – if you were 100 percent residential then it would be a lot different,” said Dilger. “Each school has different students and you have to make your own deliberations based on that.”
Though around two-thirds of Southern’s students are commuters, Dilger said other factors also play a big role when deciding whether or not to close the university.
“It depends on a number of factors,” said Dilger. “It depends on what kind of storm it’s going to be and how intense it is. It depends on what time of day it comes in, the length of time it’ll be here. How many students and staff will be affected at any given time and how long it will take to clean up afterwards. All those kinds of things come into play.”
Southern student Joseph Schifferdecker, who commutes daily from Hartford, said he thinks SCSU should take into account the large number of commuters when deciding whether or not to close.
“I think it is good to accommodate to commuters, especially since there are so many of them,” said Schifferdecker.
But Schifferdecker also said there could be ways round closing the university.
“If they wanted to keep the university open, then they would need to find another way to be fair to the commuters,” said Schifferdecker. “If classes were to commence despite bad weather then maybe professors should take note about which students need to drive and which live on campus. Those who commute should be given a group email about what has been done in class and what students need to do. Something like that should be feasible.”
Though last semester the university was closed the day before finals, Schifferdecker said opening the library isn’t necessary if the weather is bad enough to put students at risk.
“Do most students really think it makes much of a difference studying in a library one day before the start of finals?” said Schifferdecker. “My friends and I who needed to study found a way to do it, so I think there are other options people need to consider just in case this situation were to happen.”
Schifferdecker said he finds SCSU usually is good at ensuring commuters won’t have to make any dangerous journeys into college if the weather is bad.
“SCSU generally does enough to help me avoid those dangerous journeys,” said Schifferdecker. “I am sure if the weather were truly bad enough that SCSU would be closed, but on those in between days that have moderately bad weather, driving more carefully would seem like common sense.”
With America being hit with record low temperatures this winter, and last winter having higher than normal snow falls in the New Haven County area, Dilger said it depends on the year when predicting how many times the university will close over the winter period.
“In recent years we’ve had to close because of the hurricane conditions and then there was nothing like that this year so it really depends on the season and what’s happening at any given time,” said Dilger.
Though sometimes the university might close and the weather doesn’t turn out to be as bad as the forecast, Schifferdecker said it’s better to close the university than put students at risk.
“Weather can be very fickle and it is hard to determine the risk. I think they are better off making the mistake of closing early and the weather not being bad than not closing and the weather becoming bad,” said Schifferdecker. “They are better off dealing with an inconvenience than a liability.”
