With the weather outside getting increasingly more snowy, officials at Western Michigan University are taking steps to make sure students know where to look for the announcement of the university closing.
A variety of factors play into the university’s decision to close, including the road conditions and the grounds crew’s ability to keep up with the weather conditions. The university consults the WMU grounds crew and the Department of Public Safety when making this decision.
“It’s a difficult decision,” Cheryl Roland, executive director of University Relations said. “But ultimately is comes down to the safety of our students and faculty.”
After the decision is made to close the university, Roland said she contacts the WMU Web manager who immediately puts the message up on the WMU homepage.
The message is then put up on the WMU emergency number. The emergency number is 269-387-1001. The emergency line can handle up from 45 to 50 calls at once, Roland said.
The closing message will also be broadcast on the local television and radio stations, such as WMUK-FM (102.1) and WIDR-FM (89.1).
“The whole process takes around 30 minutes,” Roland said. “It’s about a 30 second phone call to each place and we have a whole network of people in the office to help us get the word out. It’s a well thought out, methodical process.”
Ultimately, the decision of whether or not to close the university is made by university President John Dunn, the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Tim Greene and Vice President for Business and Finance and Chief Financial Officer Lowell Rinker. Neither Dunn, Greene, nor Rinker were available for comment.
In the event that the university is closed, all non-essential services will also be closed.
WMU junior Connor Douglas said that, while he doesn’t always agree with university’s decision, he understands that it is a difficult decision.
“It’s really a lose/lose situation for the people making the decision because someone is always going to be mad,” Douglas said. “And while I typically agree with the university’s decision to either keep the school open or close it down, there have been a few days I have honestly wondered what they were thinking. Specifically, there was a day last year, I pulled out of my parking lot and did a 360 into oncoming traffic. I turned my car around and went right back into my apartment. The roads were horrible and I didn’t have any exams that day so it just didn’t seem worth risking my life to get to class.”
To help prevent the need for a snow day, the university has also adopted a new snow melting system called GeoMelt. GeoMelt is an organic syrup-like substance made from the sugar beet after the sugar has been removed.
According to the WMU grounds and landscaping Web site, “The syrupy concoction is nature’s natural ice melter. Unlike traditional salt, which loses its effectiveness around 15 degrees, a load treated with beet juice works to 30 below. Because it is thicker than other treatments, it lasts longer. GeoMelt stays in the grooves and cracks of the asphalt or concrete requiring less application.”
The university adopted this snow melting system as a way to help keep the 23 miles of roads, over 100 acres of parking areas, 39 miles of walks, 200,000 square feet of steps and ramps and hundreds of doorways clear in order to prevent a snow day.
If WMU’s main campus is closed due to poor weather conditions, all branch campuses will be closed as well. On rare occasions, the branch campuses will be closed while main campus is open.
Roland said that students should always presume the university is open unless they hear otherwise because the university rarely closes due to weather conditions.
“I’ve been here awhile and I think I was at WMU for 12 years before we had a single snow day,” Roland said.
In the past eight years, the university has been closed three times for the entire day as well as a few partial days due to weather conditions.
