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In the Upton Center is a pool that is hardly shown any love. The pool doesn’t even have a name. It’s a nameless, empty, body of water.
There’s only one team on campus that uses the pool on a regular, day-to-day, basis and that’s the Olivet College men’s and women’s swim and dive teams. After that, the pool practically stands stagnant from six o’clock until the end of day.
“If I had to guess, I’d say about five to ten students come and use the pool throughout the week,” said lifeguard Karley Wheeler, a junior at Olivet, in a recorded interview.
There are open swim hours Monday-Friday from 11 a.m. until noon and then 7:30 p.m. - 9 p.m.. The pool is closed on Saturdays for chemicals being added and maintenance, but is open on Sundays from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m..
Students at Olivet College are encouraged to use the pool.
“It’s even free for the students to use, rather than the three dollars that people not from the college have to pay,” said Wheeler.
When asked about the public use of the open swim hours versus the student use, Aquatics Director Rob Brownell said in a recorded interview, “The money we get from the public that come in and use our open swim hours goes straight back into the pool. Whether that’s first aid supplies, the camera monitoring system we just ordered, or other things that benefit the pool… that’s where that money comes into play.”
Brownell also said, “In the summer time the pool is used frequently by the public, but when the school year rolls around, it’s a mix of busy here and there, but it’s not consistently busy.”
Students are more likely to use the pool when there’s an event put on by the college. Brownell also said, “Students typically use the pool when we have that pool party at the beginning of the year, it gets used here and there by some that come in on their own time, but it’s mostly used by the student body when something is going on.”
On the flip side, the most vacant time for the pool has to be the 11 a.m. and noon shifts through the week. Lifeguard Jacob Ritter, a junior at Olivet said, “No students come in and swim that time of day, it definitely is because of classes and everyone going over to the KC for lunch.” The mid-day shift is pretty boring for the lifeguards, “We usually end up arguing over who guards the mid-day shift because it’s so easy and it’s nice to get some homework done in that downtime,” Ritter said.
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