Rec. Center now using JCard readers

The new Student Recreation Center, which opened over Intersession, installed JCard readers by the main entrance on Feb. 28.

Director of Recreation Bill Harrington hopes the addition will help security, enforce the no-ID, no entrance policy of the Recreation Center and yield important data concerning the utilization of Recreation Center facilities.

"The card readers will be able to provide us all kinds of participation information," Harrington said.

Before the installation of card readers, however, monitors at the entrance manually counted the attendance each day. Using attendance figures since Feb. 18, an average of 1,368 people use the new Recreation Center on a daily basis.

"I am pleased with all the numbers. It verifies what we have felt all along - that there was a need for something like this here," Harrington said.

"This is something that the University has needed for a while and I am just glad to be a part of it," Assistant Director of Recreation for Facilities Paul Jacobus said.

Students also felt the need for a new Recreation Center and notice the increase in physical activity.

"I am so glad they are doing this. Last year, no one really went to work out and now everyone is going," sophomore Lauren Rosenblatt said.

A problem created by mandatory JCard scanning upon entrance is that not all Hopkins students and faculty have JCards. Students attending the Peabody Institute or the Schools of Nursing, Medicine or Public Health all have separate identification cards. Non-Homewood students make up roughly 10-15 percent of the total daily Recreation Center attendance according to Harrington. In addition, it is not mandatory for faculty members of the Homewood campus to have JCards.

Harrington hopes this problem will be resolved in the future by the University's enforcement of a uniform JCard identification system. Until that time, however, those Recreation Center users with valid non-JCard identification will be checked and counted manually.

The Recreation Center provides facilities for 90 intramural basketball teams, 74 intramural badminton teams and 27 intramural wallyball teams, just to name a few. Since it opened in January, the Recreation Center already extended its hours of operation to 6 a.m.-midnight, Mon.-Fri., in order to accommodate the influx of students, staff and student groups. Despite this adjustment, however, demands for facilities by individuals and student groups continue.

"We are getting hit up by a lot of student groups. We look at each demand case-by-case," Harrington said.

"There is compromise. Everybody cannot play squash at the same time. You have always got a situation where you are compromising. We are in this whole trade-off mode, and every time you do that you are going to upset someone, sometimes the majority, sometimes the minority. We don't have all the answers."

Harrington believes that developing workout schedules at times when the Recreation Center attendance is low is a better solution rather than building more facilities.

"Right now I do not think we need more facilities, but people just need to find their own times," Harrington said. "I think [the Recreation Center] is adequate. We are finding out as we go along if it is inadequate."

Some students have voiced requests for the Recreation Center facilities and old Athletic Center facilities, like the basketball courts, to be opened for general use when not reserved. Harrington believes, however, that this would be awkward in light of the upcoming renovations to the Athletic Center, in addition to being a safety risk.

"Doors are always being propped open and security goes to nothing. I am thinking 'Let's make this place as safe as we can with more active supervision.' It is a real concern," Harrington said.

To alleviate demand by students, the Recreation Center will be gaining more equipment in the near future.

"We have purchased a lot of equipment already just seeing that we have needed more," Harrington said. "We are still waiting on some equipment for the weight room. Until you get people in there using it, you never know what people want. Preferences change year by year."

Besides weight room equipment, new additions will also include televisions and satellite television for the Cardio Theater and a courtyard with picnic tables.

The renovations of the old Athletic Center include ceiling and lighting replacement and new squash courts. In addition, a new filtration system and new lighting in the swimming pool are expected in May.

"That is great. When you go to a pool area every day, it makes it a little easier to train when it is lighter," freshman Jon Kleinman said. "It changes the whole mood; it makes it feel more open and inviting and less drab.