The Mississippi State University Department of Housing and Residence Life is initiating a pilot program that offers free laundry services in the residence halls for the 2024-2025 academic year.
This change comes as the university is working to raise student satisfaction through campus-wide changes, including new dining plans and the introduction of Dawg Dollars.
Dei Allard, the executive director of Housing and Residence Life (HRL), said the change comes after several years of advocacy from the Residence Hall Association and other HRL staff members.
“We ended up getting the opportunity to make it a reality this year and try it out,” Allard said. “It’s all free loads of laundry— dry, wash, all the things for students in our residence halls.”
HRL works with Caldwell & Gregory, a commercial laundry company based in Virginia, to provide laundry services to students in MSU’s residence halls. Allard said the company has been cooperative throughout the pilot program’s development. Additionally, Caldwell & Gregory will provide metrics regarding machine usage throughout the upcoming months to help HRL determine the program’s success.
HRL will decide at the end of the spring semester if free laundry will remain accessible in residence halls following the end of the pilot program. Different metrics, including water usage, electrical usage and machine data, will be considered.
The cost of the machines will now fall on HRL and the university instead of directly on the students. In previous years, using the washing machines and dryers in the residence halls would cost $1.50 for each cycle. However, now that laundry is free, residents will have extended freedom to wash things as they please.
James Walker, the President of the Residence Hall Association and a junior agronomy major, said that one of RHA’s initiatives this year will be teaching students to be responsible with laundry.
“It’s going to be our job to educate,” Walker said. “Please don’t wash one sock. That’s what’s going to get it taken away. That’s what we consider abusing the privilege.”
Conversely, Walker said that students often overload the machines, which causes them to break. Danté Hill, the director for Facilities & Maintenance within HRL, said that he hopes that students will become more educated about the machines through initiatives pushed by HRL and RHA.
HRL has posted flyers in each laundry room across campus explaining the new initiative. They recommend that students contact their resident advisors (RAs) with questions about the machines.
Hill explained that the RAs in each residence hall have been trained by Caldwell & Gregory to teach them about the machines and how best to use them. He hopes the RAs use their training to teach their residents the appropriate ways to use the machines.
“At the end of the day, I am hoping students are excited about it,” Hill said, “but that they just use it responsibly.”
In the past, HRL has conducted pilot tests on a much smaller scale. However, due to the financial nature of this program, it was necessary to roll out the changes to all residence halls at once. Hill said this is the first time a large-scale test has been done for an HRL pilot program.
Allard said she wants to see more student-centered changes in the residence halls. She said a pilot program to test out secure package centers in the residence halls could be effective in January. These centers would look similar to the Amazon package center housed in the Roberts Building near the MSU Post Office.
Walker said that he hopes that students recognize that all of the changes happening around campus and in their residence halls are for students and because of students.
“If there’s something you want to see change in your residence halls, we’re more than happy to bring it up to our bosses,” Walker said. “This shows it can happen with enough pushback.”
