Laundry is free for students living on campus, and more recently to some students who don’t live on.
“It definitely sucks,” says Solomon Renno, an on-campus resident.
For Ashley Cheney, residence hall communications director, the instances are rare but she doesn’t want this behavior spreading.
“That’s their home, that’s their community, take some ownership from it if you see someone that’s not supposed to be there,” recommended Cheney to on-campus students.
For on-campus residents like Renno, Cheney’s words ring true and argue that free laundry is a convenience exclusively for them.
“If someone told me about it, and told me ‘hey that guy doesn’t live here’ I would actually get pretty mad,” said Renno.
In theory, it should be hard for off campus students to do laundry in dorms. Ideally, students would swipe their MSU ID to enter the laundry room and to activate the washers and dryers.
But that is not necessarily the case. In Wilson Hall, one can simply go into the building, walk down to the basement into the open laundry room and activate the appliances by pressing the buttons on them. No keys, no cards, and no money required.
Cheney says off campus students are gaining access to laundry rooms because friends who live in the dorms let them in. In Shaw Hall for example, an ID is needed to get into the living area and into the laundry room as well as turning on the washer.
Cheney reminds students that laundry services are exclusively for on campus students and any violators will be punished on a case by case basis.