Despite being in an area where the beginning and end of the school year get scorching hot, many Iowa State dorms lack air conditioning. Halls that do not have this include Helser, Wilson, Wallace, Oak, Elm, Linden, parts of Friley, and Richardson Ct. During late spring and early fall, temperatures inside these dorms - especially the older ones - can reach well above 80 degrees, leaving students with little relief from outside. While newer dorms have AC installed, the disparity creates a giant inequality across campus.

Without air conditioning, many Iowa State students struggle to concentrate while in the room and stay healthy during extremely hot periods. Additionally, sleep quality declines with extreme heat. Poor sleep leads to lower academic performance as well as a drop in both in physical and mental health. The lack of cooling discourages students from spending time in their rooms and pushes them into overcrowded areas with air conditioning such as dining halls and the library.

Installing air condition in all dorms. This is a simple solution. The short-term option is to put small portable window units in all rooms. They would use only a small amount of energy and would cost a small fraction of other projects the university is pursuing. Long-term, Iowa State should install ventilation units in all new dorms built. Eventually, extremely old halls (Richardson Ct.) need to be demolished and rebuilt. It should be no question that the new dorms will have air conditioning. Equal access to such a basic comfort is a necessity for student success.

In many Iowa State dorms, laundry facilities are poorly designed. Halls that have this issue include Eaton and Martin. There is a laundry room on each floor. This room contains two washers and two dryers. Each floor contains hundreds of students. This simply isn't enough laundry capacity for the students. In many halls, this leads to chaos on the weekends and laundry being thrown out of the machines. The shortage ends in regularly long wait times and frustrated students who can't ever stick to a schedule.

The lack of machines forces students to either stay up late and miss sleep or skip opportunities to wash clothes. Losing chances to wash clothes can lead to hygiene issues, added stress, and odor concerns among roommates and classmates. Crowded laundry rooms also lead to frustration and wasted time. Additionally, thrown-out clothes can get dirty or wrinkled, ruining planned outfits for important events. 

Instead of having one laundry room per floor with minimal capacity, have one larger room on the first floor with maximum capacity. Most other colleges do this. A main laundry room with 10-20 laundry machines often has more availability since all machines are available to anyone, as opposed to only two. This leads to less frustration and conflicts between neighbors. Plus, Iowa State can turn the spare laundry rooms into more dorms, leading to a win-win scenario for everyone.

Many Iowa State students choose to live with roommates because double sized rooms are much cheaper than singles. However, many dorms were built decades ago (or in some halls' case, a century ago) when student population needs were far different than they are today. Dorms like Helser, Maple, Willow, Larch, Friley, Towers, much of Richardson Ct., etc. have cramped living spaces that make it more difficult for roommates to get along, make it harder to store clothes and school supplies, and limit comfort for residents.

Overcrowded small rooms reduce privacy and make it harder to focus on academics. Students often struggle to find a quite space to study or a place other than their bed to unwind. Little to no storage space means packed rooms with hazardous living conditions. Cramped rooms cause stress and discomfort between roommates, leading to tension in what should be a smooth year.

Iowa State needs to address the space inequality by renovating older dorms. Dorms like Barton and Freeman are many decades old and Lyon has been up for over a century. Most rooms are tiny and occupied by two people. These dorms need serious renovations and expansions or need to be torn down and rebuilt entirely. New dorms would be expensive, but the university is already building new structures left and right across Ames. Student comfort comes first when they are paying so much money for room and board. This issue needs to be addressed immediately to ensure the safety and comfort of residents.