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Following last week’s changes to trolley routes to the Nancy Cantor Warehouse, students in the College of Visual and Performing Arts voiced concerns about access to transportation and funding at an academic listening session in the Warehouse auditorium on Friday morning.

The night before the session, SU announced that it would alter the new Euclid Loop’s route to stop at the Warehouse every 40-45 minutes after the last Centro stop around 7:45 p.m.

When SU announced on Monday it would discontinue the Warehouse trolley loop after 8:00 p.m., students who need to travel to and from the Warehouse for their classes raised concerns that the change would leave them without reliable transportation to campus at night.

Also at the listening session, which VPA Dean Michael S. Tick hosted, students pointed to issues with funds they need to complete their classwork, including printing funds and resources for project materials. Students said that in previous years their $40 credits refilled in their printing accounts semesterly. This semester, they said their accounts never refilled and provisions have changed to only allot $40 per academic year.

Michela Galego, a second-year communications design major, estimated that each VPA student accumulates around $200 in printing costs per semester, and said she feels a disproportionate amount of the university’s resources go to other colleges and schools. She said it feels like VPA students are most often overlooked.

“The reduction of the funds and the loss of transportation for the safety of the students… it’s just really disappointing to see and hopefully we can start changing that by raising our voices,” Galego told The Daily Orange in an interview. “If students didn’t have to choose between printing out their assignment and like their next meal, like that’s crazy. That’s crazy.”

Isabella Flores | Staff Writer

Students who commute to the Warehouse said SU didn’t inform them about the decision to change the trolley route, adding that students frequently stay at the building late at night and even sleep there because of existing transportation issues. One student who spoke at the listening session shared that some students bring sets of bed sheets to the Warehouse to sleep on couches in the common spaces.

Maria-Camila Molina, a second-year fashion design major, said design students frequently have to sacrifice sleep to meet deadlines for assignments, which she added has a significant negative impact on students’ mental health.

“I have lost a lot of sleep, so much so that some days I’d wake up with severe migraines and genuinely could not make it to class,” she said. “But there were also days where I’d have a migraine and would force myself to go to class, because in one day we miss so much information on current or new assignments that you will regret it later.”

In addition to concerns over lack of sleep, students expressed difficulties accessing food at the Warehouse. Ella Collins, a second-year fashion design major, said students rely on vending machine food while staying late in the evening because the cafe in the Warehouse closes in the afternoon. The Warehouse Cafe is open from Monday to Thursday from 8:30 a.m.-4:00 p.m. and Fridays from 8:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Collins also said that in her experience the Warehouse café doesn’t accommodate dietary needs, and raised concerns about the quality of food available.

“With my dietary restrictions, freshman year I only ate chocolate cake and chocolate milk. It was all that they had for me at the Warehouse that was slightly appetizing,” Collins said. “I tried working with the faculty since my freshman year about this issue, but the school was not able to help in making much progress.”

As students raise their concerns, Molina said professors have been understanding of the issues and encouraging students to continue speaking out. But Collins said with the accumulation of issues with resources, access and funding she and other VPA students feel disregarded and stinted. She said the struggles for support and resources has had a negative impact on her overall experience at SU.

“I don’t feel supported in what we do. It is not that I am not heard, I am heard, but feel that what I have to say is not being cared for,” Collins said. “I am so grateful for the opportunity to study fashion design at Syracuse University and learn from my professors. My experience here would be so much more if I was able to be supported in my studies.”

Published on February 5, 2023 at 5:54 pm