When I came to Macalester as a prospective student, I was told Mac was a place where people were more important than policies. Students have many unique freedoms here. For instance, it is quite easy to design independent projects and interdepartmental majors. Class scheduling is flexible. It is usually feasible to speak with a real, live person when you have a question.

But even Macalester is not free from bureaucracy. In general, Macalester's administrative offices are fairly receptive and perceptive of the needs and feelings of students. But there is at least one campus organization that does not have such a good reputation. I am, of course, referring to the office of Res.idential Life.

Many of Res. Life's employees claim that this negative reputation is a simple by-product of the fact that it is the unpleasant duty of their organization to enforce the rules of decent communal living and sometimes deny on-campus housing to students. These are both good reasons for Res. Life's reputation. However, I think some of their reputation also comes from the general attitude the organization takes toward its duties and the students for whom it is res.ponsible. I have heard plenty of stories from current and former students which support this view, but the only one which I know to be true is my own.

I lived on campus over the summer, during the period when the dorms were open. As August 9 approached, the Res. Life office sent out several emails detailing its policies and procedures. for check-out and summer housing extensions. None of these emails contained anything about storage. I went to the office to try to find out about the storage situation. I was never able to find someone in the Res. Life office who could answer my questions. Eventually, I was able to talk to one of the three summer RA's who told me when and where Storage-in would take place, but there was no mention of storage policies.

For four days, I put many of my belongings into storage. All three of the summer RA's were pres.ent at some point during this time.

Many of the items I put into storage were in boxes with my name written on them with a marker. However, there were certain items, such as a TV and my rented refrigerator, which I could neither take home nor put into a box. When I went into the storage room, I noticed that many items had special printed labels taped to them. I asked the RA's several times if it was necessary for me to mark my un-boxed items with these labels. I was told that they did not have any more of the labels, and that if I just put these items into storage without a label and stacked all my stuff together, I would not have a problem. I believed them, because I assumed that as the only repres.entatives of Res. Life who were available to me, they knew more about Res. Life policy than I did.

On Labor Day, I returned to Macalester and went to check my belongings out of storage. I was told by the RA on duty all of the stuff I wanted to take was obviously mine, she would not let me take anything out of storage that did not have my name on it. This was a bit annoying as I had been assured before I left that I would be able to retrieve my things. I also had an obligation to return the refrigerator that day.

I asked to speak to the Hall Director and received the same res.ponse. I spoke to his supervisor, Mr. Ramon Knox, the Assistant Director of Res. Life. When I explained my situation and asked him how it could be res.olved, he res.ponded by repeatedly explaining Res. Life's storage policy: "No student can take anything out of storage that does not have their name on it. At the end of storage-out, any items left in storage will be considered unclaimed. The Res. Life staff will look through the unclaimed items for clues as to their ownership and will return anything whose ownership can be determined to the owner." (This is not verbatim, although I heard the exact same thing several times in a row, I have never seen this policy in writing, so I can't duplicate the specific language.)

When I told Mr. Knox that I had been assured by the summer RA's that I would not have problems, his only res.ponse was to res.tate the official Res. Life storage policy. I then told Mr. Knox about my refrigerator return deadline, and he once again provided me with a clear summary of Res. Life's basic storage policy. I had long ago realized that I was not getting anywhere by asking politely for my belongings to be returned. I therefore decided to suggest a compromise. Some of the summer RA's were still on duty. Each of them had spent some time with me in the storage room and could vouch for which items were mine. Why couldn't one of them check my things out of storage? Once again, I had the pleasant experience of listening to a charming rendition of the Res. Life storage policy performed by Mr. Knox.

At this point I was not only frustrated, I was alarmed. Before speaking with Mr. Knox, I figured I might have some trouble getting my things out of storage, but that they would be returned to me eventually. However, Mr. Knox's statement of Res. Life's policy seemed to imply that my stuff would be returned to me only if Res. Life could find any evidence that it belonged to me, beyond the fact that I claimed it was mine.

I scheduled an appointment with Sarah Griese, the Director of Res. Life. Before attending this meeting, I took great care to track down as much written information on the storage policies as I could. The only place I was able to find any mention of Res. Life's storage policies was in the Student Handbook, which states nothing about either summer storage or check-out procedures.. What the handbook did say was that, "The College assumes no res.ponsibility for personal items left in storage." This makes such a strict adherence to storage policies unnecessary

To her credit, Ms. Griese was genuinely polite to me. She listened to my story and my argument. She acknowledged that the situation was not my fault. She assured me that all of my belongings would be returned to me eventually. Concluding the meeting, she did not allow me to retrieve my articles, and I felt she had not offered a genuine apology. Instead, she made the serious mistake of trying to explain Res.idential Life's policy to me.

She began by telling me that there are over forty people involved in the storage-out process. She asserted that in order to avoid complications, it was necessary to create a system and stick to it. I agree with this to a point. However, if a system has no flexibility, then it crumbles as soon as an unanticipated event happens. This, apparently, is what happened.

Ms. Griese's other argument upset me even more. I asked her why, if Macalester has no liability, is it necessary to have such a strict policy? She basically told me that the policy was enacted to protect Macalester students from each other. I said that I thought Macalester students deserved to receive the benefit of the doubt, and she replied that not every student at Macalester is trustworthy and honest.

If a long and complicated story seems unnecessary, I completely agree with you. There should not have been a story to tell in the first place. Instead of being so inflexible, the heads of Res. Life—Mr. Knox and Ms. Griese–—should have acknowledged that Res. Life did not properly inform me of its policies and found a way to let me remove my things from storage before the start of classes.

While I did eventually get my belongings out of storage, the whole incident was rather exasperating. The inconvenience did not bother me nearly as much as the attitude with which I was treated. The experience also illustrated to me that Res. Life (as an institution) does not trust Macalester students, even those who have done nothing to prove themselves untrustworthy. Worse than that, Res. Life is much more concerned with following its own procedures. than with providing each and every student with a comforting and nurturing environment. I find this appalling, but I think that there is hope for change.

I hope the offices of Res.idential Life and the Dean of Students, the Macalester College Student Government, the student body in general, and maybe even the Powers That Be of the upper levels of administration will consider forming a task force to investigate this issue or establish some forum for discussion through which students can address their grievances.