To: Vincent Boudreau, President of the City College of New York

From: Samuel Pena, student

Date: September 29, 2023

Subject: Solutions for difficulties with the escalators

The purpose of this memo is to address the problems of the escalators in the City College of New York, specifically how these problems affect the students, and to provide a solution for these problems.

Summary

I have only been at the City College of New York (CITY) for a year, and so far, the school is outstanding, but a massive problem is its escalators. The escalators constitute a significant part of student life in CITY. Most students use them instead of elevators or stairs because they are much faster and less steep. But most of the time, they do not function, slowing the traffic flow and making it much harder to get to class. I am proposing a couple of policies and ideas to fix this problem.

Discussion

 The main goal is to find a solution to the broken-down escalators. The escalators break every day to the point where you can go up and finish your class, but when you come back, they are not working. But most times, it takes the school many weeks to finally fix them just for them to break down again in a couple of days.

The escalators are so essential to student life that students with disabilities still take them. They would rather risk a chance of hurting themselves than take the elevators. The elevators are a lost cause, but we can surely improve the escalators. Because the escalators break down so much, it has to be a specific part that keeps breaking. We have such a fantastic engineering school, so instead of investing so much money in fixing the escalators just for them to break over and over again, we can have the engineering students do it as a project and get to the root of the problem. Just recently, I saw that we were changing the steps on the left escalator of the North Academic Center (NAC). Instead of paying someone to figure out the problem, we, as engineers, can do it because there has to be a reason why they keep breaking, and if you give us a chance we can solve it. This idea would save the school money and let the students learn more about things outside their specific fields. It would allow us to know how to solve real problems, but more importantly, it will let us help our school, which we care so much for.

If money is the problem, we can have a fundraiser even after the abovementioned solution. A fundraiser that a lot of people love is a bake sale. We sell baked goods, and most money goes toward the escalators. Another type is peer-to-peer fundraising, where students can make a website and let their friends and family know about the problem, and they could donate. With the money and by following the solution to have the students help, we can save so much money just in case the escalators do break again. The point is that the escalators are vital to us students, and we are passionate about ensuring they work for everybody in CITY.

Lastly, even though we have this solution, the escalators are bound to break. Nothing lasts forever, but we can have maintenance every Saturday and Sunday when only a few students are around. If the escalators break during the week, you can fix them immediately instead of waiting weeks.

Recommendation

Thank you for taking time out of your day to read this memo. Please communicate with the board and consider all these solutions. Of course, if you have any concerns or want to add some ideas, please email me at spena014@citymail.cuny.edu. Thank you again for your time, and have a great day.