After playing intramural indoor soccer in the field house I’ve come to realize that frankly, that building just doesn’t cut it. There’s grime on the floor, various items haphazardly strewn about, and a crowded, decrepit feeling to the place.
Honestly, these are not acceptable conditions for a facility that both sports teams and students regularly use.
The definition of a field house is as follows, “a building enclosing a large area suitable for various forms of athletics.”
The word that really popped out at me was “suitable.”
Several sports teams, like soccer, basketball, softball and baseball for indoor practice, and football use the field house but it also serves as a place for intramural sports.
Although field houses can also be used for storage, the way in which things are stored in that building here at Pacific take storage to an extreme, and doesn’t really seem to have student or worker safety in mind. There are boxes from track storage, and mats from wrestling placed sporadically around the perimeter, and stuffed into the corner. Some of those items even spill out onto the main floor.
Having played several intramural soccer games in there myself, I can’t help feeling a little annoyed when a ball gets kicked into the corner and disappears amidst the abyss of cartons of boxes there, or gets tangled up in the mesh divider the separates the field house into two sections. I’ve seen a lot of people fall because of it and I wonder if that is even safe to have in an enclosed area.
I understand that there are financial reasons why Pacific can’t build on the field house now or expand it, however I think there are things that can and should be done to improve it, and make it more suitable for everyone who uses it.
Organizing the stored items in the field house could help make that gym look and feel less cluttered. Simply stacking things against the wall, out of the way would be better than putting half the things where they are now. That way people could at least play without worrying about tripping over an extra mat.
The main gym is a well-maintained facility and the face of Boxer sports, while the field house is like its sad forgotten sibling that people shove in the corner and only talk to when they have to.
Yes, we’re stuck with it for right now and students are making use of it, but why not fix up the field house while we have it? In the name of both safety and pride, let’s give the ugly duckling a make-over, even if it’s just a tiny one.
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