<p>All our dorms, all my kids’ dorms, are locked. With a squawker, if propped open. Huge issue for personal safety, especially for women. </p>
<p>One reason some housing depts charge now for the extra damage is that they operate as their own budget centers, rather than being line items in the college’s budget. Their revenue pays for all their services, incl all dorm activities, RA’s, RD’s, staff, furnishings, utilities, and more. Why should they take away from funds for their own priorities to pay for additional student damage?</p>
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<p>You wouldn’t leave your house unlocked during the day, would you?</p>
<p>Then again, I remember that residents would sometimes prop the (always locked when closed) door open for their friends to enter, even though they were always telling students not to do that since that allowed thieves (or worse) to enter as well.</p>
<p>I have, but usually by accident. Then again no one at all is home when i’m at work. </p>
<p>On a campus, during the day, there is a lot of legitimate in and out activity. I go in and out of the residence halls all the time. There are offices on the bottom floors of two, the dining hall is connected to one, the student grill was in the basement of another, and due to construction on campus, one has meeting rooms that needed to be used as classrooms this year. </p>
<p>Anyway, such is the culture of some campuses, and you can be as horrified as you want at how “unsafe” it is, but the incidents we have happen mostly at night, after the doors are locked. Doors get propped open. Kids let in somebody standing in the doorway because they “look okay”. Oh, and then there’s the crazy notion that some of the incidents actually involve the hall residents. At least I don’t think anyone saved up enough pee to make several urine bombs and then lugged them in from outside – but I guess you never know.</p>