By Jasmine Hsieh
The Scene staff
The Forest Park fitness center is only open to students in physical-education classes, and other students wonder why.
“Everyone should be allowed to use (the fitness center), as long as they are registered students of St. Louis Community College,” said computer science major Terry Lewis, 34.
It’s not just a Forest Park issue. Students on all STLCC campuses must be enrolled in physical-education classes to use fitness centers.
The college would have to provide additional staff if the Forest Park fitness center were open at other times, said Sue Martin, chair of physical education on campus.
“This is not a recreation facility, per se, contrary to what many students see at other institutions,” she said. “The fitness center has not been open (to all students) before.”
Many colleges and universities in the United States have fitness centers available to students for free or at a low cost.
St. Charles Community College allows students with valid college IDs to use its fitness center for free after they have completed a Fitness Center I class.
Students, faculty and staff at Lewis & Clark Community College in Godfrey, Ill., also have free access to its fitness center and other athletic facilities, including swimming pools and tennis courts.
“They even can buy annual passes for their families at a reduced cost,” said Christine Strotheide, administrative assistant of student activities and athletics at Lewis & Clark.
Forest Park allows students, faculty and staff to use its swimming pool from 10 a.m. to noon Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays for free. Open hours in the gym were eliminated after employees reportedly were assaulted when trying to get people to leave on time.
The swimming pool, gym and fitness center are in the Physical Education Building. The college furnished it with new strength and cardio equipment in 2012.
Strength equipment includes Nautilus pin-select machines, a cable-crossover and dual-cable pulley machines, a squat rack with a barbell and plate weights, a chin/dip machine, stability balls and a Gravitron machine. Cardio equipment includes recumbent bikes, Schwinn Aridyne bikes, stairmasters, treadmills and ellipticals.
“It’s hard to find a good gym in St. Louis,” said art education major Pj Weakly, 22. “I go to school here, and I work here. I would love to also be able to use the fitness center here.”
Students have to be enrolled in Fitness Center I or II (or another class that requires use of exercise equipment) to access the fitness center. These are the two classes most students take to fulfill physical-education requirements for degrees.
Forest Park also has a small weight room that’s used for weight-training classes. Like the fitness center, it was furnished with new equipment in 2012.
The weight room has dumbbells, barbells and plate weights for use with benches and racks, a Smith machine, a pin-select lat pull-down machine, a pin-select toe or calf raise machine and a hammer strength leg press machine.
At one time, the weight room was available to students whenever the Physical Education Building was open. Officials closed it after some free weights were stolen.
“A few people committed the crime, and everyone is paying for it,” said education major Natalia Valero, 28. “This is not fair, but I understand why (the college did) that. We need to protect the equipment.”
STLCC’s Risk Management advised the Forest Park physical education department that the weight room couldn’t be used for recreational purposes without proper instruction and supervision, Martin said.
“We don’t necessarily have the funding to pay for the gym supervisors or part-time (employees) to be there the whole time,” she said.
Early this year, the STLCC Alumni Association distributed a flyer informing people that “dues-paying members ($25 annually) will have access to gym facilities.”
Martin said she was unaware of such an arrangement.
“Those things were never conveyed, or at least not to me,” she said. “(There was no discussion on) how we operate, in terms of our fitness center or weight room.”
Alumni aren’t supposed to use the fitness center or weight room unless they’re enrolled in a physical-education class.
“That’s not how our operation works,” Martin said. “Generally, the only people who are to be in the instructional area during that time with an instructor are those people who are enrolled in the class.”
Ashley Budde, coordinator of alumni relations, said alumni should contact each STLCC campus to find out what facilities are open to them.
“(The association) isn’t responsible for negotiating with campuses about what facilities are open to alumni,” she said.
Martin isn’t ruling out the possibility of someday offering Forest Park students a place to exercise.
“Obviously, this is something we can work on for the future, to look at how we can possibly have some open recreation of the facility in general,” she said. “But a lot of things will have to change.”