In the first few weeks of the new school year, University students became accustomed to the constant sound of fans running in the dorm rooms. The combination of a heat wave and humidity forced students to seek refuge in any way they could find.

Lounges and study areas were filled with students attempting to soak up any available cool air. Students resorted to studying and doing homework in the basements of their residence halls in order to escape the stifling heat.

Tank tops and flip-flops became staple clothing items and freezing classrooms became somewhere students looked forward to going to.

Students ran multiple fans in their rooms and kept their windows open at all times to try to combat the high temperatures.

Freshman Kyleen Wilhite lives in Harshman-Dunbar and said that she was no exception to that.

“I had three fans running in my room at all times,” Wilhite said. “I had one mini-fan clipped onto the end of my bed, my roommate and I had another mini-fan pointed at our futon and we also had a very large box fan cooling the whole room.”

Of the seven residential buildings on campus, Offenhauer and Founders are the only two that offer air-conditioning in the rooms. Both are mainly upperclassmen residence halls and both come with a higher price tag.

A multiple occupancy suite in Offenhauer costs $2,550 per semester and in Founders, a multiple occupancy suite costs $2,670 per semester.

The higher price tag isn’t only because of the air conditioning. The rooms in Offenhauer and Founders are a little bigger than others, which also contributes to maintaining a cooler climate.

For those upper-class students living off-campus, there are many housing options available. Students can choose to live in university-sponsored apartments, located on North Enterprise, East Merry and Frazee. Or they can choose to find an apartment or house on their own. However, the university-sponsored apartments do not include air conditioning.

Unlike in the residence halls, students living off-campus can choose to put air-conditioning in their living spaces. There are a wide variety of options available for air-conditioning. One look in the yellow pages of the Bowling Green phone book will turn up ten or more results for vendors in the city of Bowling Green and its surrounding areas.

Junior Lori Petrick has been living in an off-campus apartment for about a month now. Petrick and her two roommates live in Campbell Hill and rent their apartment through Greenbriar. Their new place comes with air -conditioning, but Petrick still remembers what its like to suffer through the heat. Her advice for those students stuck in residence halls without air-conditioning?

“Use fans and keep lots of popsicles on hand,” Petrick said. “But don’t worry, this is Bowling Green, the weather won’t stay warm for long.”