What would calendar change do to OU energy use?
By Nick Claussen
August 7, 2008
When Ohio University created its six-week Christmas break during the 1977-1978 school year, it was intended to cut down on energy costs, especially those involved with heating the campus.
Now that the university is considering eliminating the six-week break if it switches to a semester calendar system, the natural question is whether it will cause the university to use more energy at a time when energy prices are rising.
OU switched from the semester calendar system to quarters in the 1960s, but did not implement the six-week Christmas break until 1977, according to OU spokesperson Sally Linder. Before that, the break was two to three weeks.
The country was facing an energy crisis in the late 1970s after the Iran hostage crisis, and families, businesses and school were all encouraged to do what they could to save energy. During the height of the crisis, people were even discouraged from stringing electric Christmas lights.
Linder explained that when the switch was made at OU, the university encouraged faculty to do projects outside of the classroom during the break, such as working on research projects, in order to help save energy. The university also encouraged administrators to take their vacations during that time, she said
OU did not offer any classes during the six-week break until the 1997-1998 school year, when some classes began being offered during the intersession period.
Athens resident R.J. Abraham lived in Athens in the 1970s, and was teaching at Athens High School when the six-week break was created. He said he understood why the university wanted to create a break to save energy, but he thought they chose the wrong time to close.
“I could never figure out why did they change for the energy when November and December are not the months we need to worry about,” Abraham said. He added that November (OU is closed for part of November during the break) and December are not as cold as January and February, and it would have made more sense to close then.
THE ENERGY SITUATION has changed greatly from the 1970s till today, and staying open during winter now probably won’t make much of a difference for energy usage, according to Sonia Marcus, sustainability coordinator for OU.
“What once may have been an appropriate approach to conservation of energy, really does not seem to be producing any measurable savings anymore,” Marcus said.
The big difference between the 1970s and today is that now OU is spending much more energy and money cooling the buildings on campus than it would have spent in the 1970s, Marcus said. Air conditioning was rare in dorms at that time.
“Our cooling days have become more energy intensive,” Marcus said.
The university conducted an energy analysis a few years ago to see if there would be any appreciable utilities impact from switching to semesters and eliminating the Christmas break, and determined that any impact would be minimal, Marcus said.
“The impact of switching from quarters to semesters, frankly, might have been larger if we had not been using so much energy for cooling in the first place,” Marcus said.
ABRAHAM SUPPORTS the switch to semesters, and said he has written OU officials explaining how changing the calendar system and the eliminating the long Christmas break will help OU students and benefit the community.
He recalled that before the six-week break was created, OU students took part in Christmas parades in the city, decorated for the holidays, visited local nursing homes, and were involved in holiday activities on campus and in the community.
And when the students left for Christmas a week or two before the holiday, they would put their Christmas trees out by the curbs and local residents often would come along and pick up the trees and use them at their homes, Abraham said.
All of the university involvement ended when the six-week break was created, and Abraham hopes that some of the activities will come back if the long break is eliminated.
As a teacher, he recalled that the break was also hard at the high school because so many students left town during the break because their parents were students or faculty members at OU and left Athens for the six weeks.
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