Cleanliness is Next to Godliness

There are so, so many problems with the way BYU does student housing. For example, their policy that all students have to live in "BYU aproved housing" or the fact that they charge us by room.

But I think the worst housing policy is the cleaning checks.

Since coming to BYU in 2009, I have lived in four different apartment complexes, each with their own version of cleaning checks.

Some were great and acted more as a routine maintenance check.

Some just sucked (ahem... Bountiful Court).

This month's cleaning check at the Riviera was the most ridiculous yet. When we got back from break, we found a notice on our door saying that cleaning checks were going to be super strict from now on and "Happy New Year!"

Last week we got our cleaning check forms in the mail. We were scheduled for checks on Tuesday between 8 and 9 p.m. At 8 o'clock sharp, we were ready. The apartment was immaculate. We waited until 9 to touch anything.

We didn't eat. We didn't shower. We didn't go to sleep.

9 o'clock came... and went... so did 10... and 11.

Finally we all just called it a night and went to bed. Before I fell asleep I put my cleaning check form on my desk.

At 9 a.m. the next morning, I woke up. My first conscious thought was, "I wonder what's going to happen with cleaning checks?" Automatically, I looked over at my form.

It wasn't there.

I didn't think too much of this. Grabbing my computer, I proceeded to check my Facebook, Twitter, email, etc. That's when I saw my roommate's status:

Waking up to a strange lady in your room. Creepy! Can I say, cleaning check lady, your're almost 8 hours late!!!!! And we are all sleeping!!!!!! Gosh! I had more time to sleep! This was not ok. .... Not ok at all.

Slowly, it began to dawn on me. About two hours before I woke up there had been a complete stranger in my bedroom poking around for signs of dust and dirt.

NOT OKAY.

A few of my roommates and I went over to the office to discuss our concerns. They apologized profusely and swore it wouldn't happen again.

Still- there's got to be a better way, BYU.