A group of students gathered in front of Joe West Hall on Wednesday afternoon in hopes of changing the conditions and lack of accessibility in the dorm's laundry room.
Many of the students were from an activism, action and resistance class.
Communication junior Mariana Valadez said the students created a campaign focused on fixing the Joe West Hall laundry room to create an accessible and safer path for the people living in the building.
“Especially with the amount you're paying for tuition, you should be getting the resources for what you're paying,” she said. “And it's just not safe and we've had people come and tell us their conditions that they've been in and how the elevators don't even work and the doors don't even open and have to prop it up with rocks.”
Valadez said the state of the laundry room has caused some students to go to SJSU Express Laundry and other laundromats off campus.
“For the amount you're paying to be living here – I just don't think it's fair,” she said. “Especially for people who can't access the laundry room, like, what are you going to do?”
Communication senior Finn Mathews said Joe West Hall is not the only dorm facing problems. They said they faced issues when they were living in Washburn Hall during their freshman year.
“For example, in Washburn, some of my friends weren't able to actually hear the fire alarms when it was going off in their rooms, which is really, like, it's a really concerning safety issue,” Mathews said.
Mathews said they and Valadez tried to communicate with the multiple people on campus to fix the issues but never received any response.
“We've also been trying to contact the Residence Hall Association and we've reached out multiple times and just heard nothing back from them, which is frustrating because considering the workers, the students trying to make housing safer and safer and better for students,” Mathews said. “We were hoping that the right Residence Hall Association [would] contact us back but we haven't heard anything so far.”
Communication studies lecturer Lucas Hatton was protesting with his students in front of the building.
“I want to support what they're doing, what they're about to give assistance to make sure that that the action is successful,” Hatton said.
He said he believes engaging college students in similar activities is an important way to further their education.
“Creating something is the highest demonstration of knowledge about it,” Hatton said. “So if you can go out and create a campaign, then you have to take everything you’ve read in a textbook and put it into action.”
