Many Kent State students were unable to access their rooms Thursday evening after a software malfunction resulted in their housing status not being recognized.
George Edmiston, director of Facilities and Capital Development and University Housing, said the issue stemmed from an incorrect copy of Kent’s housing roster being uploaded to their database.
“[The malfunction] impacted students by removing their housing assignment in the control system, so the system didn’t know what their housing assignment was, so they lost access because of that,” Edmiston said. “[The system] knew who the student was, it just did not know that they had a housing assignment.”
The issue began Thursday afternoon, with students from all dorms being affected in some way, according to Edmiston. He said the issue was fixed by about 8 p.m., but that students didn’t have access to certain areas until later.
“We believe all [issues] have been resolved. The issue was actually resolved yesterday, but there are downstream systems that need that data,” he said. “The correction was made late yesterday but overnight it continues to push out changes to all the individual locks and things like that.”
He said just over 6,000 students live in residence halls, with an unknown number being affected by the accident. Students’ access to facilities at Kent is based on their housing status.
“When a student lives on campus their access is all based on where they live, and if the system doesn’t know where you live then it doesn’t know which buildings you need access to, which bathrooms you need access to,” Edmiston said.
The university has experienced similar issues with students being locked out of their dorms in the past. Edmiston said the problem will likely not happen again as the university has moved to automated housing systems.
“This is probably the biggest instance that I’ve seen as far as the number of students that have been impacted in the past,” he said. “The good news is that this whole process is going to change with our new assignment system that we’re implementing.The new system will have a process that does that in an automated way from the software, so it’s less chance of a human error.”
He said the new system will be implemented over winter break and operational by the spring 2025 semester.
Students faced issues with their dorms starting in the afternoon on Thursday, with some not gaining full access until after midnight.
Kris Soukup, a sophomore computer information systems major, lives in Koonce Hall. He said he had to have other people let him in Kent State buildings just to reach his dorm, and did not have access to his room until 12:30 a.m.
“I was trying to get into the lobby but it was locking me out,” Soukup said. “Finally, we got in there and the elevator didn’t work either. Someone else had to bring us up in the elevator. And then we get upstairs and they had the bathroom door propped open because people couldn’t even get into the bathrooms.”
“There was a little bit of a security issue,” he said. “People were leaving their doors propped open just to go to the bathroom. It was a little sketchy.”
Karter Cordell, a freshman architecture major, lives in Centennial Court B. He said he didn’t want to leave his room because he didn’t know if he would be able to return.
“You would just have to find somebody to let you in. I was nervous, I don’t want to leave if I can’t get back in,” Cordell said. “My friend didn’t eat last night because he didn’t want to go through the trouble of, like, getting somebody to let him in and everything.”
Andrew Bowie is a beat reporter. Contact him at [email protected].
