I am the mother of a college freshman. She has been living in the dorm for about a month now, and has been sick almost the entire time. She is currently on 4 medications for respiratory issues. Many other students in her dorm are experiencing the same issue.
At first, we just suspect a back to school virus, but her dorm has a VERY strong mildew smell that you can smell immediately upon entering the building. In addition, her laundry and everything that she brings home that has been in her dorm has that same strong smell.
Finally, she has had several water bottles develop mold in them at school.
Has anyone else had this experience - and if so, what did you do?
Aside from the unpleasant smell, I am really worried about the long term effects on her health. We are paying $10,000 a year for her to live in this building! What recourse do we have?
You can talk to the residence office and see what they say. She could try to move to another dorm at winter break – sometimes space opens up when students drop out or leave for study abroad.
Has she taken something like Claritin to see if it improves? I am allergic to mold, and it helps me,
One school I know of found mold in a dorm and had to move all the students out immediately while they renovated and removed it. They happened to be located on a body of water, and brought a cruise ship in for the students to live on for several weeks!
you need to EMAIL the Dean of the College, cc the Dean of student affairs and the President of the college asap and notify them they HAVE created a Health Hazard FOR ALL STUDENTS in that dorm . I kid you NOT.
DEMAND that your DD be moved to another dorm immediately!
CC the Board of directors of the college as well.
Mold in a closed environment is NOT to be taken lightly.
Mold – chronic mold that you can’t get rid of by removing damp things or cleaning --is bad and can cause bronchitis and lifelong asthma, I believe. A long time ago, we used to live in a moldy apartment with cinderblock walls that grew mold – I would spray the walls with bleach, and the walls had mold resistant paint, but it didn’t stop it. I put those moisture absorbing things in the closets, too. H and I both got bronchitis living there. And his developed into asthma. We had two kids there, and they both had chronic ear infections.I’ve never had bronchitis before or since living there, and neither has he. At the time, I didn’t know mold could cause all of these health issues. And this is, I suppose, anecdotal, but I am convinced the mold was the culprit in our health problems that we had living there.
mstee-I believe it. My family rented a nice house when our D was a toddler and from the moment we moved in she always seemed to be getting a gold or allergies or something related. The bedrooms were in the basement. In a year she developed a “cough variant asthma” but we always thought it was because her dad and grandmother had had childhood asthma. We never put two and two together, even after we found mold that was removed. From the moment we moved into our own home with hardwood floors her asthma lessened to the point of being almost gone-THAT’S when I realized it had been the other house. She will probably always have asthma, but she’s down to 1 or 2 episodes a year instead of dozens.
OP, definitely notify the school and make a fuss. This is nothing to take lightly.
justonedad - there IS a big difference between the odor of smelly, dirty clothes, and MOLD!
A wiff by someone who has smelled both is all it takes to tell the difference.
Mold is a serious health issue that should not be written off as just “dirty laundry”.
dirty laundry emanating from the room of another student does NOT cause these things to happen:
" her dorm has a VERY strong mildew smell that you can smell immediately upon entering the building. In addition, her laundry and everything that she brings home that has been in her dorm has that same strong smell.
Finally, she has had several water bottles develop mold in them at school."
OP- bring this to the president of the college’s attention immediately!
There is no time to waste with going through channels.
If the odor has gotten THIS bad, then lots of people are already ignoring the problem!!
Your daughter is on campus. She should be able to go to her RD or speak to someone on campus to handle her problem. You’ll run through road blocks because of FERPA. She will be able to communicate with fluidity. She’s an adult now. Let HER email the President or the Dean. I would not say that there is a health hazard unless you know that for sure.
@sseamom – same here. H’s asthma is mild now – he uses an inhaler for vigorous exercising, hardly ever has to use it otherwise. After we moved, I started reading about mold and became aware of health issues related to moldy living arrangements, and put two and two together. My dad’s condo also had a little bit of a mildew problem, H’s asthma would flare up when we stayed there. In that case, after we helped my dad clean out his closet and get a new mattress, it helped a lot.
I’ve smelled a lot of boys dirty clothing too. Mold is different. Although, of course if you leave a pile of wet clothes lying around, chances are it will mildew . . . I’ve never noticed a mildew smell in any of my kids’ dorms. Four kids, four dorms in different colleges. Not tidy rooms, either in a couple of the cases. So there were some smells. But not mildew. It should take a long time for a water bottle to grow mold, in my experience. Actually, I don’t recall ever having that happen. Tea, coffee grow mold fairly quickly, within days. Don’t ask me how I know . . .
I do think that people tend to be alarmist when the word mold is mentioned. But the fact that your daughter’s clothes smell when she brings them home is worrisome.
Your D should tell the RA and ask for a response within a day or two. If she doesn’t get a response within the time frame or if it is dismissive then I would personally take the issue up the chain of command.