When temperatures went into negative numbers last week, students rushed indoors to seek warmth.
But their jackets didn't come off. Despite the nearly record low temperatures, some buildings, like the David Rittenhouse Laboratory, didn't have their heat turned up enough - or on at all - forcing students to shiver through their classes.
There is no one office or person to blame for the cold classrooms, and that's the problem. Mike Coleman, executive director of operations for Penn Facilities, said in an e-mail interview that while the centralized Operations Control Center monitors building temperature, they don't always have the power to change it.
Depending on the type and age of a building or what it's used for, the OCC has a varied amount of control. Coleman added that his office is working overtime to combat the effects of the current freeze. However, if the OCC doesn't have the ability to regulate temperature in all buildings, their efforts can only go so far.
At the local level, building managers should also theoretically be managing building temperature. And yet, students reported turning on heaters themselves last week, a sign that management at the individual building level also isn't as efficient as it could be.
Ultimately, it doesn't matter who is responsible. This apparent lack of coordination between the local and central offices should be fixed before the next cold front strikes campus, and students find themselves having to wear mittens to their midterms.
