Students move into new dorm one week late

By Maddie Garvis//

The first group of students moved into Hood College’s new residence hall on Aug. 22, a week after their scheduled move-in day, due to COVID-19 related delays in the building’s construction.

The still-unnamed residence hall was scheduled to be completed by mid-July, according to Hood’s Vice President for Finance Charles Mann. Mann explained that the largest delay came from the shutdown of a manufacturing plant responsible for supplying the construction crews with a vital building material, Glass Fiber Reinforced Concrete (GFRC), that makes up much of the building’s structure. 

“The plant that was making the GFRC actually shut down for a period of time because of a COVID outbreak within the plant,” Mann said. “That put them behind on all their clients’ orders, and things didn’t get here as rapidly.” 

This significant setback, among others, resulted in students not being able to move into the new residence hall until Aug. 22, after the first week of class. Students who were unable to remain off-campus for the extra week were offered temporary rooms in other residence halls.

Becky VanWychen, the area coordinator of the new residence hall, said that 95% of the building is complete at this point, with only small cosmetic details yet to be finished. 

“It’s just all the little small touch-up pieces that need to be finished,” VanWychen said. “The construction company themselves will actually be coming in in December and finishing all those final touches.”

The new residence hall is comprised of both suites and semi-suites that give students a private bathroom, a difference from the other residence halls on campus. VanWychen stressed the benefits of this change. 

“You share a bathroom with one to three other people instead of twenty other people living on the floor,” VanWychen said. “So that’s a huge benefit for our students who don’t want to have to use a community-style bathroom.” 

VanWychen also highlighted the building’s additional lounge and community spaces as a huge benefit for students. She said the spaces will be amazing for students to use to build new relationships within the community, with proper social distancing being maintained, considering that we’re living in a “COVID world.”  

Mann emphasized that COVID-19 was a huge obstacle in completing the building’s construction on time, but that the construction crews did their best to continue working safely during the pandemic. 

“It’s really a testament to all the people that worked on that project that we were able to get it open nearly in time for you guys to move into,” Mann said.

The new residence hall is housing 157 Hood students this semester, slightly less than its 201 student capacity.