http://ticker.baruchconnect.com/article/elevator-etiquette/
Elevators in Baruch College are a well know spectacle, in an unfortunate way. This opinion article written by Marielle Bachman, in the Baruch Ticker, describes the daily ordeal most Baruch students face in their daily trip up the elevators in the campus. She focuses on elevator etiquette which basically is a fancy term for showing proper manners in an elevator, which Bachman feels students lack in this school. She describes how apparently nice students turn into “a pack of bloodthirsty wolves” when they try to get a place inside an already packed elevator. Bachman proposes to students to put deodorant just in case they have a foul smell after rushing into the elevator. She goes on to condemn students who block a majority of space at the front of the elevator, stating “since when did the front of the elevator become some sort of VIP or first-class ordeal?” I agree with this statement because I have seen for myself, many students stalling small areas in the elevator which could have fitted a few other people. Bachman also advises freshmen not to put their arms between the elevator doors to keep them open since they will only “suffer pain, quite a deal of embarrassment, and perhaps even dismemberment.” She reasons that eventually every student will at some point in their undergraduate years, be stuck in the elevator. In the article, Bachman shares Junior Ana Recio’s testimony of an experience she had in one of the elevators in the college. Earlier on, I stated that some students tried to catch the elevator by putting their hands in between the doors to keep it open. Unfortunately, Recio witnessed a similar incident where one student’s arm got caught between the doors of the elevator. Recio describes the incident as “something out of a movie”. She explains that although the trapped student was experience a rather ill-fated accident, Recio and the other students in the elevator could do nothing about it. She says “Of course, they closed on his arm and the entire elevator watched in stunned silence as his arm flapped back and forth for a solid minute. The best part was that no one made a noise except for one other kid and I, who couldn’t stop laughing until we reached the 11th floor.” Bachman concludes on the note that although such incidents are prone to occur, they can be avoided. All we need to do, in Bachman’s words, is to be mindful of the people we share the elevators with. Then only will the awful reputation of Baruch’s elevators disappear once and for all.
Sanjay Gurung