I for one had no idea there would be so many hidden fees that seem to be inevitable if you are a student at Mississippi State. From parking tickets to lockout charges, MSU finds small but significant ways to make money off of our everyday mistakes.
It’s as if we need another class to enroll in during freshman year: How to be a student at MSU. In this class, we would learn valuable lessons, like parking in a Service Parking Only space for 20 minutes will earn you a ticket faster than parking in a handicap space overnight. I learned this lesson the hard way.
I’ve had three parking tickets in one semester at MSU. One of them was pure ignorance of the law. It’s sad to admit, but I was not aware that when you parallel park, you must park in the same way as the flow of traffic. This lesson earned the university $20, which helped to pay for the MSU cruiser bikes, according to Parking Services in an earlier news story about the bike program. This brings up an interesting question. Should the mistakes of students living on campus be turned into profit for the university? Are our tuition, housing, meal plan and textbook payments not enough?
After each time I notice a parking ticket placed so neatly underneath my windshield wipers, I have to go find another place to park. Having a North Zone parking pass gives me several options, none of which are too appealing. If I want to make sure my car isn’t bumped with another car’s door or accidentally backed in to, then I park at Ruby Hall or survey the vast open country of the Griffis Hall parking lot, where some cars go to find spaces and never return. Either choice ensures a long walk back to my room in Building 3 and the added possibility that if you don’t drive for several days, you may completely forget where your car actually is.
Or I could circle the parking lots behind Critz or Sessums where I will find all the spaces are full. My next choice might be the parking lot on the hill in front of Building 3, where I will either be forced to park in a yellow loading zone (which will promptly earn me a ticket), or try to squeeze my four-door sedan in between two full-sized trucks (which could earn me a dent in my door). It’s almost as if Parking Services is herding us like cattle to park in illegal spots so they can write another $20 ticket or put another $100 boot on an overnight offender.
Parking Services is not the only organization making money off poor college students. The Department of Housing and Residence Life can make $7.50 every time you leave your key in your room or if your roommate locks you out and leaves. Most likely, you, your roommate or someone you know has had to pay a lockout charge. I’m more forgetful than most and had to pay three last semester.
Your identification card is your life at MSU. It seems unfair to charge so much money for forgetting or losing it. Let’s say you have a meal plan and live in a Zacharias Village residence hall, such as myself.
One weekend I lost my card and had to rely on my roommate to let me in and out of the room. I stepped out of the room, forgetting I did not have my card, and was locked out. I then had to pay $7.50 for the resident assistant on duty to walk down a flight of stairs and use a master key to unlock my room, which took less than 5 minutes. I also had to pay more than $8 out of pocket at the Perry Cafeteria a short time later because I did not have my card and hadn’t memorized my identification number. The following day, I went to Allen to replace my card, where I had to pay $35 to replace that palm-sized piece of plastic, but if you look at other expenses I had to pay because of the lost identification card, the total for a lost card for one day came out to be more than $50.
As college students spending thousands of dollars every semester just to stay in school, we cannot afford to spend unnecessarily, even $5, much less $50. I plead to those in the administration to reconsider these idiotic fees and stop trying to make profit from our mistakes that you make as well.
Ben Leiker is a freshman majoring in biological engineering. He can be contacted at [email protected].