Lounge closed to students

Last year, students entering the ground floor of Ballantine Hall were greeted with the occasional smell of popcorn and the murmur of students going in and out of the front lounge. This year, the double doors on either end of the room are closed off. They're locked and bear signs that ward off students letting them know the room is for faculty and staff only. The room is now a quiet haven for key-holders to enjoy the increased privacy and air conditioning to hold meetings, grade papers and work on course tasks.\n"It was always a faculty lounge," said Emanuel Mickel, professor of French and chairman of the Ballantine Hall Committee.\n"After a while, we decided to leave it open to everyone and after a couple of years, it began to get so crowded," he said. "This was for a number of reasons. They closed the study rooms upstairs and so people began flooding down here. Now it's closed off to undergrads because there just wasn't room to sit anymore. There were people sitting on the floor."\n"Up until around 10:30 a.m., things would be fine, but then students would come and it'd get too crowded," he said.\nStudent Body President Bill Gray said many students have come to him with their worries about the change.\n"Students are concerned there is no place for them to spend 15 minutes between classes at Ballantine," he said. "They don't have the money to go to the Union and eat and the lobby was an excellent place to pass the day.\n"I think and I hope they will take corrective measures for the change," Gray said.\nRobert Eno, president of the Bloomington Faculty Council, said in the past, keeping the lounge for faculty proved unprofitable from a food standpoint.\n"It was used only by the faculty in the past," he said. "But after a while, it was opened up to everyone since the cost of food service became an issue."\nEno said the restoration of the lounge also came about because of the lack of accommodations in the building's upstairs offices.\n"Ballantine Hall offices are in bad physical shape," he said. "Many offices have no air conditioning and can't because the electric units in the building can't take the increased load. People who use this building felt the needs were being ignored by campus. The state legislature isn't providing money even for maintenance and everyone thought there was a responsibility to take care of this -- what they saw as a major issue."\nEno headed the agenda committee for the Bloomington Faculty Council that conducted a survey asking faculty and staff to note the issues they felt were the most deserving of attention. The committee developed the survey in conjunction with the residential halls on campus and found its restoration was an issue of top concern.\nGraduate student Josh Schneider has access to the lounge, which only key-holders are permitted to enter. He said the return of the faculty lounge is a good idea because it's now a quiet place for grading papers and doing work.\n"It's certainly convenient and quiet, and it's not on the sixth floor, which is nice," he said. "It's essentially a secluded corner for faculty and staff. You don't have to walk 20 minutes to the library to find a quiet place to work. If this wasn't here and you don't have a car, you'd have to go 20 extra minutes out of your way just to get there."\nMickel agreed.\n"There's other places for students to go to like the Union, but there's no specific room on campus for faculty," he said.