Residents of Alford-Montgomoery Hall (Al-Monty) started off the quarter by being told they need to pack up their belongings and move to another hall. A boiler failure causing heating issues is what made housing decide to have residents leave the building. 

Vice President of Public Affairs Kremiere Jackson, provided information on the incident.

According to Jackson, the facilities director was in contact with the housing department to let them know that one of the boilers used to heat the hall and water was experiencing a failure. The failure meant that students living in Al-Monty would not have access to heat or hot water. 

Jackson said due to supply chain issues, they are unsure when the damaged boiler will be repaired. Until then, Al-Monty will remain closed. Jackson said their hope is to have it up and running by fall quarter for new incoming students.

In the meantime, residents of Al-Monty will have to move to new resident halls.

“We made the decision unfortunately right after spring break that we needed to move those students,” Jackson said. 

Jackson explained that as of Thursday, March 31, the decision was made to have students in Al-Monty move to new halls such as Sparks, Davies and Quigley by Tuesday, April 5. Those three halls are where Al-Monty’s students will stay until the end of the quarter.  

“We felt like that was the best solution for the students so that they will not have more disruption,” Jackson said.

In order to help ease the disruption at the start of the quarter, Jackson said they contacted faculty of affected students to allow for accommodations as they transition and move to their new living spaces. 

“If there are accommodations that need to be made academically, we have contacted them [faculty] as well so that they are aware,” Jackson said. 

According to Dawn Alford, the director of strategic communications & digital media, other ways the university offered resources was by providing boxes and offering help during the relocation times. 

There are 70 total students that will be moving from Al-Monty, five of which are Resident Advisors for the building. First year student Ryan Gildersleeve explained what the experience has been like for him. 

“It was not a fun situation,” Gildersleeve said.  “A lot of it was just confusion and anger.”

Gildersleeve explained that leaving Al-Monty after building a strong community amongst the residents was weird.. 

Gildersleeve said he moved into his new hall on Thursday, March 30. According to Gildersleeve, it was a very clean transition between halls despite being last minute.

“Moving was really good,” Gildersleevse said. “The RA’s did a good job of keeping doors open for people that were coming in, it was a really congested situation but everyone here handled it really well, it was a fairly easy moving process.”

Despite the sudden change, Gildersleeve said he looks forward to what the change will bring as he finishes the year. 

“I’m definitely excited,” Gildersleeve said. “It kind of shakes things up and after the dust settles it’s exciting being in a whole new area, you’ve got so much more to explore and people to talk to.”