<p>Tonight our news carried an item about the student council spending $400 for samples/travel size of soap, toothpaste and so on so student will wash their hair, shower and brush their teeth!</p>
<p>Really?</p>
<p>Well at CPW there were free samples of hand sanitizer, so it’s totally possible.</p>
<p>Well, for the record, we all think it’s ridiculous that this is a national news item as well.</p>
<p>It’s not just a national news item–it was in the MIT campus paper yesterday.
[UA</a> will provide free deodorant samples during finals week to reduce Reading Room stench - The Tech](<a href=“http://tech.mit.edu/V130/N19/uahygiene.html]UA”>http://tech.mit.edu/V130/N19/uahygiene.html)</p>
<p>Eeeewww.</p>
<p>this. is. real. gross.</p>
<p>Kids interviewed said “YES” - lots of students ignore general personal hygiene…</p>
<p>How can that be? I am speechless…and this perplexes me–</p>
<p>Is it cultural?
Gender specific?</p>
<p>I equate the school with the best/brightest and its “on the list” for our student.</p>
<p>and personally find that when feeling tired and stressed–a nice shower and to be freshened up does a lot for one’s outlook…</p>
<p>I cannot imagine how bad the dorms must be, and the laundrey…</p>
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<p>Oh, come on. Ha ha, nerds are smelly. Can we seriously just get over it?</p>
<p>It’s a ridiculous news item. Many students think that it’s a ridiculous bill. Yes, we shower. Yes, we do our laundry. Do an experiment for me, before you judge. During finals week at one of your schools (your kid’s high school, your own high school, a local college, whatever), go to the most populated study area, filled with the most kids, and turn up the heat a little bit, and we’ll see how rosy it smells there.</p>
<p>If you are seriously going to judge MIT because our reading room gets a little smelly during finals week, I guess your priorities are somewhere other than a world-class education, at a top-notch research university with brilliant faculty and dynamic and engaging peers.</p>
<p>The News, sensationalizing dumb local stories since… ever? For the record, most of those student’s comments were either half-joking and/or taken out of context.</p>
<p>" The Committee on Space Planning and the Campus Activities Complex are also working together to put up posters in the Reading Room promoting stress awareness and good hygiene.</p>
<p>Last school year, Senate passed a bill to keep hand sanitizer dispensers inside the Student Center filled, primarily in response to concerns about cleanliness in the fifth floor Athena cluster."</p>
<p>so we can have a world class education AND be nice to be around.</p>
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<p>LOL. I also thought a previous poster’s suggestion that those two must somehow be mutually exclusive was pretty absurd. (For the record, it really doesn’t stink in the reading rooms of most colleges, even during exams.) Doesn’t MIT have a program during freshman orientation called “Charm School”, or something like that, to encourage students to practice good hygiene?</p>
<p>Charm School runs during IAP. See the website here: [MIT’s</a> Charm School | About Charm School](<a href=“http://web.mit.edu/charm/about.html]MIT’s”>http://web.mit.edu/charm/about.html)</p>
<p>It is more focused on etiquette, dating, and people skills than on hygeine.</p>
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<p>I saw this quote earlier and I finally have a computer now so I can comment.</p>
<p>I just want to point out this is the classic erroneous extrapolation. It’s quite unfortunate that syndicated news networks picked up on the news, and they proceeded to broadcast it all over network TV with suggestive news banners, but seriously, most students thought this bill was more of a gag bill and thought it was ridiculously hilarious more than anything else (especially if you’ve seen the Facebook reaction of the MIT community after the news came out in our Tech). If you need a news flash right here, YES, WE HAVE SHOWERS AT MIT, AND STUDENTS USE THEM. YES, WE KNOW WHAT SHAMPOO, SOAP, AND TOOTHPASTE ARE.</p>
<p>Yes, the reading room and the Athena cluster on the fifth floor of the student center have this lingering musty smell but I thought it was just the design of the room (lack of ventilation) over anything. Even now, I seriously doubt it’s the body odor of the students that are the main culprits. Every once in awhile you hear about this certain Course 6 major (ok, sorry to stereotype : P) who was up for a few days coding and hasn’t gone to bed or showered, but I really haven’t met one, and I still question how many of them actually exist. Quotes like those found in the interview are generally taken out of context, and just more of this stereotypical “nerds smell bad and don’t wash themselves” stereotype that propagates jokingly at MIT. I doubt people really think this is a persistent problem here that interferes with our quality of life.</p>
<p>Also, our reading rooms don’t smell. Yes, I’m not sure what’s going on in the 5th floor of the student center, but I invite you to explore any of our libraries or 24-hour study lounges scattered throughout the campus. You may pleasantly discover that MIT students are people too, and not pigs! (le gasp!)</p>
<p>All this goes to say that if anyone is seriously concerned about the merit of this news article and would make a college decision based on this, then you really should get out more and come tour the campus for yourself, instead of believing whatever the heck CNN says.</p>
<p>The chairs in the 5th floor of the Student Center either need to be replaced or steam-cleaned on a regular basis. </p>
<p>The dorms are fine.</p>
<p>I never studied in the Reading Room. It seemed kind of small and I was never comfortable studying there.</p>
<p>haha interesting…</p>
<p>So is there any truth to the rumor that MIT is considering changing its name to Omnibus Polytechnic University, so that its new acronym will better reflect the nature of its student body?</p>
<p>I’ve been to plenty of colleges. Students are filthy, horrible animals. This is a universal truth.</p>
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<p><em>cricket chirp</em></p>
<p>“The dorms are fine.”</p>
<p>My son told me some people in Random Hall do not take shower and smell badly.</p>
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You can find people like that at any school. Overall, it’s just not an issue.</p>
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<p>Yeah, and everyone East Campus is weird, and everyone in Baker joins a fraternity, and everyone in Next House is Asian. I fail to see what regurgitating a second-hand stereotype proves.</p>