Camping Out On Campus a Big No-no

The Simon Fraser University Surrey campus is a very open and inviting place. It is a campus with 24-hour security to ensure that the students and property are safe with the campus itself opened for 24 hours a day, and contains many technologically advanced resources.  However, a problem is raised regarding whether the campus is too inviting, as there are many students and even outsiders who sleep over in the study rooms or classrooms within the campus. Perhaps there is not enough awareness targeted towards the students that let them know what they’re not allowed to do. You may think it is the security’s job to stop students from sleeping on campus, but they can only do so much. It would be ridiculous if most of a security guard’s day were spent waking up students and telling them to either wake up or go home.

Some students are literally bringing in their own sleeping bags to school because staying over at the campus to study or work on school projects. Other students and the security guards have seen homeless people already asleep in our team rooms on campus. A fellow Surrey campus student stated that he saw some SFU students sleeping on desks when he went to his 10:30am lab class! Furthermore, there were concerns over some people using the couches in 3390 (Simon Fraser Student Society room) to sleep on as some students feel that it is very unsanitary and awkward knowing that those who sleep on the couch may not have showered or have drooled over the couches. In addition, it is not exactly safe for students to fall asleep on campus because security states that they do not know if students who are asleep may have gotten a heart attack since they are unconscious, and do not want the added burden of looking over sleeping students. Besides, it is against the school rules for students to sleep on campus, but a short nap is okay since there are many students who go to school feeling tired and need some shuteye rest. On the other hand, some nappers maybe fall into a deeper sleep of more than 3 hours accidentally, and another issue is that if it is very late at night, these students may not be able to go home since it is not a safe time of day; so do they have to stay over at the campus wide awake the whole time? This concern is a recently brought up issue, but it is not a new problem on the Burnaby campus. The best way to resolve this issue would be to let everyone know that it is not okay to camp out on the campus. Go home and rest!