Early during the 2009-2010 academic school year, a few senior residents of Boston College decided to custom-design their common room. At Boston College all of the senior living arrangements have common rooms, and many students decide to spruce it up with posters or flags to make it visually appealing. However, these students decided to have the artist amongst them paint the four teenage mutant ninja turtles on the wall - images that are reminiscent of their childhood. Not surprisingly, Residential Life was unhappy with the walls being drawn on when they did their health and safety inspections of the college dorms.
Despite the name of the housing sweep, it is clear that the painting does not represent a safety, health or fire hazard. Instead, Residential Life is concerned that the paintings deface campus property, which is an entirely legitimate concern. However, in this case, no furniture has been damaged and the wall is fully functional. Not to mention these paintings of the teenage mutant turtles are beyond impressive and not even the strictest staff member of Residential Life can ignore that. Unfortunately, this is a hard-to-win battle despite the heavy disapproval from the senior class of Boston College who are unhappy with ResLife's decision to immediately paint over the turtles and impose a fine on the residents. It is important to note that these paintings are neither profane nor destructive but rather a work of art. While I understand why ResLife policy can be harsh at times, I think BC ResLife needs to make an exception for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If Residential Life is intent on wanting plain looking, unblemished walls for future students, Residential Life could simply allow the residents to keep the turtle paintings for the remainder of the semester while requiring the students to paint over the entire wall in white before they leave. I think such a measure would still capture the goals of ResLife without facing opposition from the student body - especially considering the students are paying for housing for a year.
Furthermore, I believe that if BC students were to know in advance of a room painted with these turtles, such a dorm room would be one of the first to go in the lottery system. I can believe students would find it very neat to be the ones with the "turtle room." However, if BC is going to turn the blind eye to artwork, in which many homeowners have paid hundreds of dollars on similar wall paintings, they can at least take some form of middle ground that allows the students to maintain the turtles for the rest of the semester. If Boston College honestly finds the need to fine and paint over the turtles, would it not make sense to wait to do that anyways? I fail to see how the turtles on the wall pose any health or safety concern. Furthermore, there is certainly no immediate need to paint over the wall, which is why I find Boston College ResLife unjustified in wanting to paint over the turtles while the residents are still living in the dorm.
(reproduced with permission of resident)
