All the cool kids study here.

Guys, I go hard at Club Olin, all the time. So when I discovered a room in Chalmers that I didn’t know about, I was like, what?!

The room I discovered just this past week, the Ringwalt Room, is tucked away on the second floor of Chalmers. To find it, walk straight past the circulation desk and hang a left after the microfilm (now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d write).

So what’s this oaky, pedagogical paradise for?

It’s hard to say. Ringwalt doesn’t have normal hours, which leads me to believe that it’s a hotbed for criminal activity.

No regular library hours in Ringwalt.

Failing that explanation, it could be used as a meeting space for LBIS staff. This was confirmed to me when I walked by Ringwalt this morning, only to find the most suspicious group of librarians you’ve ever seen, sitting around a table (and talking about books, ostensibly). Their ringleader, Julia Lynn Warga, was running the meeting.

The library’s “quiet policy” further illuminates Ringwalt’s purpose as a meeting room (for criminal activity).

Under “Exceptions” (this room is exceptional), the policy reads:

    1. Louder conversations are permitted in the following locations, but the doors should be closed:

•     the Parnassus Room (the Classics classroom), on the 3rd floor of Olin [during a class]
•     the Writing Center, on the 1st floor of Olin
•     the Ringwalt Meeting Room, on the 2nd floor of Chalmers
•     the Group Study room, on the 2nd floor of Chalmers
•     the Language Learning Center, on the 1st floor of Chalmers [during a class]
•     the Chalmers Computer Lab, on the 1st floor of Chalmers [during a class]
•     LBIS staff offices

LBIS even admits that Ringwalt is a place for closed-door meetings! Can’t get sketchier than that, folks.

One can only speculate why it’s called the Ringwalt room. Maybe the library felt insecure about the names of its study rooms and wanted to name it something pretentious, but not Philomathesian pretentious.

The room may also be named after Amy Jo Ringwalt-Sawan ’86. Or maybe they meant to name it Ringwald (see: Molly) and misspelled the nameplate.

Friends, we have an obligation to reclaim this room from its criminal roots. If we use this room for studying (and really, why wouldn’t you?), we can stop the librarians from executing their evil plans, like trying to request the same book from Ohio Link AND Inter Library Loan. We can’t just sit back and let Olin fall into decay.

So check out the Ringwalt Room sometime. It’s your duty now.