In response to Steve DeLaurentis' Letter to the Editor regarding the unfortunate mud problem on campus ("Please save me from the mud," Feb. 11), I wish to voice my complete agreement. Steve proposed one solution: "Architects in the past (smarter than those employed by Notre Dame) have built buildings with no pre-planned walkways connecting them - then after a year of observing the patterns worn into the grass, they subsequently paved those slowly-trodden pathways."
Unfortunately, this method creates an entire year of muddy walks about campus without the alternative option of clean concrete pathways. Instead, I have some more suggestions as to how Notre Dame could fulfill their responsibility to keep students' shoes clean when they voluntarily walk through mud.
1. Students should have the option to send their class schedules to Ziolkowski Construction in order for them to customize the sidewalks on campus to better accommodate every students' walking needs.
2. Students should be provided a personal assistant that will physically carry them to all their classes, and if need be, lay down face first in the mud so we can walk over them.
3. Complementary shoe shines should be available at 2,500 locations around campus so that no Domer will ever show up to a place on campus with a thin layer of mud around the base of their shoes.
4. Students should be given jetpacks so they can take the most direct, mud-free route to class. That's right, I propose that jetpacks no longer be available only to student athletes anymore.
5. All grass on campus should be uprooted and replaced with astroturf ... or carpet.
6. All classes should be held in dorms or off-campus residences so students don't have to walk at all.
7. Janitors should use hand held blow-driers to dry up every collection of moisture that settles on the lawns of Notre Dame's campus.
8. Notre Dame should build a giant roof over campus so no precipitation or sunlight can contribute to mud formation on our pristine University ever again.
Although these solutions may be a bit costly, I can't think of a more important issue Notre Dame could focus their efforts toward then ensuring all students the right to walk through mud without arriving to class with muddy shoes.
Zeb Hunter
senior
off campus
Feb. 11
