Most Princeton students are all too familiar with late-night study sessions. The experience is often less than ideal, an exercise in last-minute cramming or rushing to reach a page limit. Often, however, late-night studying is made more unpleasant than it needs to be by the difficulty of finding comfortable places to study, particularly for upperclassmen. To help rectify this problem, Princeton should increase the number of study rooms in upperclass dorms and install more vending machines around campus.
While there are a variety of study spaces on campus, options are limited late at night. On most weeknights Firestone Library closes at 11:45 p.m. and Lewis Library and Frist Campus Center turn off the lights at 2:00 a.m. At many of our peer schools, some libraries stay open 24 hours a day; in the absence of such a space at Princeton, the creation of more study spaces in upperclass housing is even more crucial.
Most of the residential colleges have study rooms, dining halls and libraries that students can use late at night. But students in upperclass housing have far fewer options. For example, both Cuyler and Brown halls have no study spaces at all. Students in these dorms must walk relatively far distances in order to find a comfortable place to study, which can be a significant inconvenience. Additionally, some students are concerned about walking across campus alone at night.
By creating more study spaces in upperclass dorms, the University could avoid these problems. Ideally, every dorm should have a study space accessible indoors — both in upperclassman and underclassman housing. While this is not something that can or will happen immediately, the University should make this a priority when it renovates old buildings.
Furthermore, the University should install vending machines in dorms located far from convenience stores. The popularity of the U-Store, Studio ’34 and the Wa demonstrate the high student demand for late-night snacks. But many dorms on campus are relatively far from these stores, making them somewhat inconvenient for students, and only the third is open for 24 hours. Installing vending machines in dorms would help ensure that all students have more convenient late-night food access, especially on a campus that isn’t connected to the amenities of a city. Moreover, installing vending machines seems to have few downsides — the machines should pay for themselves over time and would therefore not be a financial burden on the University.
The late-night study session is a near-unavoidable element of student life at Princeton. We certainly don’t deny that we’re pampered already — but through some simple changes, the University can significantly improve the experience of night owls across campus.
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