Ware College House is undergoing renovations for the 2024-25 academic year.
Credit: Isa MerriamSeveral first-year students told The Daily Pennsylvanian that renovations to the Quadrangle have significantly impacted their social and residential experiences at Penn.
Ware College House— the central section of the Quad, Penn’s traditional first-year housing — is undergoing renovations for the 2024-25 school year. The renovation, which involved the closure of 624 bed spaces, fully separated the upper and lower Quad and forced students to use alternative entrances to the area.
The students who spoke with the DP shared their challenges with dining options, laundry access, and excessive noise caused by the ongoing construction.
College first year Tejas Bhatia, who lives in Fisher-Hassenfeld College House, said that he came to Penn with high expectations about the Quad, saying that he was looking forward to the “quintessential college experience” when he ranked Riepe College House as his first choice.
“It would be really interesting to see all of the [Quad sections] connected,” Bhatia said. “I feel like I really missed out on that part of the Penn experience.”
College first year Brandon Seff, who also resides in Fisher-Hassenfeld, said that the construction has disrupted what he anticipated would be a lively, social community. Seff described his Quad experience as “less social” than expected.
Bhatia also discussed the inconvenience of the upper Quad's gate closure, which requires students to exit and reenter the Quad to move between Riepe and Fisher-Hassenfeld. The entrance is set to reopen at the beginning of the spring semester in January 2025.
He described the closure as “really inconvenient, especially when you’re trying to get to class in the mornings.”
Several students also complained about noise stemming from the construction, despite all rooms immediately adjacent to the construction area being unoccupied.
College first year Krisaana Gunsagar — who lives in the New York Alumni section of Fisher-Hassenfeld, a section directly adjacent to the construction — said she has been woken up by noise “every morning.” Gunsagar said that the sounds of tools, voices, and music are frequent around 6:30 a.m.
Penn Director for Design and Construction Scott Nobel wrote to the DP that "[s]everal actions are occurring to minimize noise disruption to students living adjacent to the construction,” adding that “[l]oud construction noise during quiet periods is minimized.”
Gunsagar also told the DP that the construction has reduced the convenience of doing laundry in the Quad, citing Fisher-Hassenfeld residents often used Ware laundry rooms in previous years.
“For the first few weeks, it was impossible to do laundry,” Gunsagar said.
Since then, a laundry trailer has been set up in the upper Quad, temporarily providing access to more laundry facilities as construction continues.
Students praised Riepe's new renovations, which included refurbished spaces for students to study, socialize, and relax with others. Riepe now offers four reservable lounges, along with study spaces and common spaces indoors and outdoors.
However, several said that the renovations have not entirely eliminated the issues they intended to solve.
“A pipe exploded and flooded my room around three days ago,” Wharton first year Laura Carbajo, a Riepe resident, told the DP. “It’s honestly been a mess.”
Carbajo also mentioned that she has seen cockroaches and rats in Riepe this semester.
Fisher-Hassenfeld will be the final section of the Quad to be renovated when it is closed for the 2025-26 school year.
Nobel added that “[t]he renovation of the Fisher-Hassenfeld section will benefit from the ability to apply existing solutions developed during the renovations of Ware and Riepe to similar unforeseen field conditions.”
Bhatia told the DP that he hopes — when Fisher-Hassenfeld is renovated in the 2025-26 school year — “future years and future classes get to have that quintessential college experience that we all wanted to have.”
Penn also closed the Cafe at McClelland, a central dining and common area in the Quad that offered seating, study areas, and package lockers until August 2025 as part of the ongoing renovations. In its place, the University opened the Penn Dining Sushi Spot outside of the Quad.
The Daily Pennsylvanian is an independent, student-run newspaper. Please consider making a donation to support the coverage that shapes the University. Your generosity ensures a future of strong journalism at Penn.
Donate
