Photo by Shubhechhya Mukherjee | Mercury Staff
As the semester kicks into full swing, the Student Union is
allowing Comets to kick and swing even more by providing a new dance floor.
Registered student organizations and departments are able to
request the dance floor for their events through their Electronic Management
System accounts. Andrew Helgeson, assistant director of SU, said that the
current dance floor has gone through some significant wear.
“We have a couple student orgs that use it every single
week,” Helgeson said. “And then there’s more far and few between, some more for
larger scale events that student organizations are putting on: they want to do
a banquet with a dance floor in there. I’d say we’re probably doing the dance
floor anywhere between six to 10 times a month.”
Helgeson said that, like the current dance floor, the new
dance floor will only be available for use in the Galaxy rooms, due to how
heavy and cumbersome it is to move. Also, like the current dance floor, the new
dance floor will consist of 48 four-foot by four-foot square pieces that can be
latched together into different rectangular configurations. After the new one
arrives, Helgeson said, the old dance floor will no longer be available for
use.
“First, we don’t have any room for storage for it, and then
just it’s a problem because it could be a safety hazard,” Helgeson said. “A lot
of times, people want the biggest dance floor possible, but we can’t put it in
there due to size restrictions, due to other tables and chairs in there and
making sure we are ADA compliant at all times.”
Despite the expensive price of a new dance floor — some
quotes reaching as high as $40,000 — Helgeson said the wear and tear of the old
dance floor justifies the cost of the new one.
“We’re doing a rush order to get it in as soon as possible,
and we’re hoping to have it in stock before we have that banquet season coming,
before May,” Helgeson said. “We want to give something of quality to our
students.”