There is no doubt that Point Loma Nazarene University is blessed with a beautiful campus. However, the opportunity cost of living next to the Pacific ocean is the limited amount of open space.
With the hundreds of on-campus clubs and activities and the constantly increasing student population, this problem only seems to grow. Even individuals simply desiring to throw a frisbee around are having a difficult time finding a place to do so.
“I don’t understand why I can’t use the soccer field if nobody else is on it.” said PLNU freshman Nicole Orth.
The two main locations that contain open areas of grass are the soccer field and baseball field, which often have signs posted restricting the use to students.
“If the school is only going to provide one field for recreational use, they should open it up to others as well…” said PLNU freshman Marley Gang.
While having the soccer field closed at all times to non-intercollegiate activities does appear as a burden to students, the faculty at PLNU is doing their best to accommodate as many activities and programs as they can in the limited amount of open space.
“We are really a campus trying to serve roughly 3,000 students, and we really have two green spaces on the whole campus,” said Ethan Hamilton, the Athletic Director at PLNU.
He also mentioned that our limited amount of flat open space is the opportunity cost to having this campus location. If PLNU was located in a state such as Iowa, there would be no shortage of open areas.
One way in which the faculty is trying to accommodate programs while keeping the fields in good condition is by offloading onto the field that is currently out-of-season.
“What we really try and do in the fall is offload the majority of the activity, which could mean classes, intramurals or just open use to the baseball field, which obviously isn’t ideal for baseball. But we try to carry the major load and burden of that on the baseball field in the fall and then in the spring semester we will flip it,” said Hamilton.
Another issue that is commonly brought up among students is the fact that most club sports are forced off of campus to practice and to play due to the limited amount of space.
“It is more of an institutional decision and it has always been that the priority has been on intercollegiate athletics and academics,” said Hamilton.
Another major factor to consider is the fact that neither the soccer nor baseball field is outfitted with lights.
“We are really looking at sunrise to sunset to get everything in that we need,” said Hamilton.
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