When I first came to Oberlin, we had full-time monitors that walked through the facility checking, among other things, secuirity issues and compliance with our no food or drink policy in practice rooms. This worked out pretty well until about five years ago when monitor positions were cut in a poorly conceived budget crunch. Guess what happened -- enter food and drink to our practice facility and all the associated ills and spills (even an ant problem for a while)! Well.....we tried everything. Notes on music desks, notes on walls, articles in the student paper, pleading with faculty members to set a good example (guess how successful that was), loss of practice priviledges, etc., etc., etc. However, we did find something, eventually, that seems to work. FINES!! Plain and simple, if ypu are caught in a practice room with food or drink, it's going to cost you 50 bucks. And to put some clout in the $50.00 fine policy, myself and the assistant dean perform periodic "purges" through the practice facility, entering rooms to inspect for food and drink. We announce our purpose to the occupants, fine those that have violated the policy (the fine is assessed to their term bill), and politely explain to those innocent the thousands of dollars in damage that liquid spills can create in a piano. It only takes about an hour to do and is a very effective form of preventive maintenance. For those of you that might be turned off to the "policing" nature of our purges, I was surprised to find how many students (the innocent ones, of course) were not disturbed at all by our inspection. To the contrary, many of them commented that they, too, were concerned about the quality of our instruments and would help via peer pressure to enforce the no food/drink policy. Ken Sloane, Oberlin Conservatory
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC