This past Monday, May 1st, the boiler was shut off for the remainder of the school year for renovations. This decision to leave the school unheated was immediately picked up on by both students and faculty, as the weather has continued to remain terrible in the greater Seattle area this spring.

Although many of us were left wondering why the heat was turned of when the temperature still resembled that of January in Seattle, the reality of the situation was that this boiler shutdown has been continually postponed because of the weather.

“We could have made this move earlier,” said Dean of Students, Chris Bilanko. “To this point we had tried to push it back as far as we could have and that May 1st date was as far back as we could let it go.”

With mass refurbishments in store for Blanchet over the next couple of years, one facet of the school that is do for its update is the building heating system. A crunch for time revolving around the schedule of the school year has left Blanchet no other choice than to get the boiler shut down and the renovations underway.

“To make the timeline so that we could start school on time next August, there are certain things that have to be done while we’re still in school currently,” said Bilanko. “Whether that was things that happened over Easter break, or things that are happening throughout May, or June. When we’re dealing with construction, we’re talking about a very small window to do a lot of stuff. There’s certain things that have to be compromised and in this case it was the heat.”

Although getting the boiler turned off when they did was imperative to keeping the school’s renovation plans on track, the Leadership Team was aware that the extended bad weather would make it impossible to please everyone with the decision to go without heat for the remainder of the year.

“You hope to get to early May and start to see the temperature go up a little bit, especially in the mornings,” said Bilanko. “It’s definitely hard to predict in Seattle and the weather we’ve seen as of late has proven that. But, at the end of the day, it’s out of our control. We knew that we only have a month left and the contractor’s need to do some things with the boiler. In order for them to do that, the boiler can’t be on.”

Although the next couple of weeks are certainly guaranteed to have their fair share of cold days in the halls of Blanchet, it will be vital to remember that a heating system that works consistently year round is in our futures. Unless, of course, you’re a senior. In that case… chalk it up to bad luck and keep it moving.

“Getting a boiler that works every day will be good in the long run,” said Bilanko. “I think the biggest plan is to make sure that we have a heating system in place that works consistently year round and produces enough to heat a building of this size. I’m confident that the new boiler will be able to do that for us.”

Personally, I can’t knock the Leadership Team for making the decision to turn off the boiler this past Monday. Acting under the assumption that we would be able to go without heat this late into the school year was the right call; this terrible weather we’ve had to endure is simply bad luck.

If you had told me at the beginning of the school year that the heat would be turned off on May 1st, I probably wouldn’t have thought twice about it. I know for certain that I wouldn’t be worried about it still being 55° and pouring rain every hour of the day. Then again, Seattle never ceases to amaze me.