At UMass Amherst, living on campus is great. You are close to your classes, the gym, the dining halls and most importantly, making new friends in your dorm hall! There are so many benefits when living on campus, and it’s important to understand and use all the amenities that are included in room and board. Fortunately, UMass Amherst offers a great number of maintenance services when living on campus because you always have to pray for the worst and hope for the best. Take it from me, it is truly helpful…
Recently, my roommate and I discovered the benefit of Emergency Maintenance and health services for an experience that others may not have thought of beforehand. My roommate before spring break was experiencing small bumps that we believed were stress-induced to the craziness of finals and pre-vacation high. As she and I both traveled over spring break and the sun in Spain warmed our skin, relaxation sunk in and the thought and remnants of stress hives escaped our minds.
Once we arrived back to school, that relaxation was abruptly taken to halt when after one night of sleeping in our dorm room, she discovered what she thought were more stress hives. This discovery made my roommate question if they really were presumed stress hives or something else. Although we did not believe she had bed bugs, she was sure that something was there, with me and other friends questioning such thought due to the fact that I was not experiencing any sort of bites as well. My roommate was on the hunt to determine what was causing such a reaction to her skin. Freaked by the invasion of privacy, she removed and cleaned all of her bedding. The bumps continued and she had decided that health services would need to get to the bottom of this disturbance. I agreed that it was a good decision to uncover the truth. The next morning, much to my surprise, I had woken up with four itchy bumps. This was a true awakening and understanding that something, not mentally, has invaded our space in our room. We both went to the doctors together to determine the fact that they were indeed spider mite bites, YUCK!
Fortunately, health services were amazing and timely. The doctors were able to see us almost immediately via the text-in service offered to students and gave us proper care and medication to reduce the itch. We were advised to clean our sheets, towels, and vacuum the carpeting. Our next step was contacting Service Routine Maintenance Requests. They were there the next morning and were available to explain what they would do in our room to prevent the spiders from entering through the broken window seal or the heater. They were helpful and took the extra steps to make sure we knew that our spider infestation would be taken care of. Luckily since that night, we have experienced no new spider bites and feel better with our choice of UMass Amherst. Both services offered made me feel as an individual that my voice mattered. They were able to help provide a solution and take the extra steps when needed.
iService Requests and Emergency Maintenance are available for all dorm halls at UMass. Click here to see what they can help you with! Additionally, the text in line for the clinic can be found on their website with this link.
Lastly, if something is going wrong with your room or with your roommate, any RA is always happy to help and answer questions because that is what they are here for!