University tests viability of 24-hour study area

While those papers aren't going to get easier, staying up late to do them might.

The Frist Campus Center normally stays open all night during midterms and reading period, but if a USG effort is successful, a 24-hour study space will be open all year round.

The USG is using this week to gauge whether students want a place to study all night.

The project is spearheaded by USG Senator Pettus Randall '04.

This "is something that USG members have been discussing for years," USG President Nina Langsam '03 said.

However, many questions, including location and funding, are still up in the air, USG officers said.

Randall will meet with campus center director Paul Breitman on Friday to discuss logistics of transforming Cafe Vivian into an all-night study space.

The original plan to make Chancellor Green open 24 hours after it is renovated is still on the table, Langsam said.

"I talked with [President] Tilghman about this," she said. "She liked the idea of having it in that place."

Meanwhile, the USG has proposed two areas, Firestone Library's trustees reading room and Cafe Vivian, as temporary spaces.

If the cafe were to be open 24 hours, Frist would have to pay employees to work late at night and may have to build a separate entryway, Randall said.

Breitman has suggested building an extra entrance leading directly into Cafe Vivian so that students could access the area without the entire campus center remaining open. Librarian Karin Trainer said similar provisions could be made for the reading room.

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"The main issue is funding," Langsam said.

A 24-hour study space would initially need funding from the Priorities Committee, but Randall said he thinks an all-night cafe would prove to be self-sustainable.

"We feel that the sales from Cafe Vivian would compensate the money that would be spent on keeping Cafe Vivian open," he said.

Randall, who is serving his first year on the USG, has adopted the 24-hour study space as a pet project.

"When I talked with people on the Ivy Council about the availability of 24-hour study spaces on campus, they were shocked to learn that Princeton does not provide such an area for its students," Randall said in an email.

Princeton and Cornell University are the only Ivy League universities that remain without such spaces, he said.

Some professors raised concerns at Sunday's USG Senate meeting that an all-night study space would encourage unhealthy sleeping and studying habits among the student body.

Another concern is security, Langsam said. An all-night venue might attract people from outside the University and lead to crime, she said.

Indeed, two Princeton residents were arrested at 5 a.m. Monday morning in the campus center for possession of stolen property. It was the first night of Frist's expanded midterm schedule.