What Patron's Like versus Dislike about Recreation

With every advantage there are always disadvantages depending on how people look at them. Since I’m a supervisor for the front desk at the Campus Recreation Center at Tarleton State University, I took the opportunity to ask random people what they liked versus disliked about our Recreation Center  facility.

Now, keep in mind that the Rec Center can help build self esteem, reduce stress, improve communication skills, and improve weight lose. Whether the patrons using the facility realize it or not, the Rec Center can help build a patron’s character, get stronger physically and more importantly mentally. In Scott Forrester’s article he wrote “Students were asked, “In what other ways has your participation in campus recreation activities, programs, and services helped or enhanced your experience at this college/university?” Over 6,700 students responded to this question. The top 5 responses were..”

• Meeting new people and forming relationships
• Relieving stress
• Physical fitness
• Improved health by weight loss and control
• Fun and enjoyment

Likes

• Equipment (clean and variety)

• Hours
• Atmosphere

Photo Cred: Tarleton State University- Campus Recreation

Some of the things they liked included the equipment, hours, and atmosphere. The patrons like the equipment because it was well kept and  if they saw a machine broken, within a week, it was fixed. They also liked the fact that there is a wide variety of machines to use. The Rec Center hours were both liked and disliked by the patrons. While some said that it fit their schedule and they enjoyed the hours that were provided, we also had patrons that said it should be open 24/7. These people said that they do not have time to come during the hours that are provided and are hoping one day soon that we will change the hours to be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Everyone mentioned the great atmosphere that is present when they are in the Rec Center. Patrons enjoy the positive flow of energy going around whether it is in the weight room, the track upstairs, or while using the courts. As Rec Center employees, we pride ourselves in giving the patrons a positive atmosphere for them to enjoy during their time in the facility.

Dislikes

• Lack of space
• Lack of equipment
• Music selection
• Dress code
• No Smoothie Bar

Photo Cred: Tarleton State University-Campus Recreation

I found that the dislikes had a bit of a longer list. Patrons said that there is an overall  lack of space and  equipment. They also dislike the music playlist, dress code, hours, and the fact that we do not provide a smoothie bar or something similar. When they mentioned the lack of square footage, they said that there is not enough space during the prime hours on weekdays and also no room to stretch or roll out. I’ve personally seen people use the basketball courts to stretch on because it was so busy everywhere else in the Rec Center. The equipment or lack thereof was also on the dislike list for patrons. They said that during the prime hours, it’s hard to find a machine to use, or when you do find one, there is a good chance of somebody stealing it while they were still using it. They also added that there weren’t enough squat racks, platforms, or ab mats. One thing I’ve noticed while working at the Rec Center was the music playlist. No matter what we play, we seem to upset a group of people. The music is either not good enough or the patrons do not like the lyrics to the songs because of abrupt language. One common complaint is the dress code. It seems like every day we are having to send patron’s home to change because they do not meet the dress code requirements. The main reason we send patrons home is because their shirt is either cut too low or they don’t have one on at all. Even though the hours seem to please most people, some have a different mindset. They said the hours we provided were inconvenient for them and wish we’d change them to 24 hours seven days a week. They said their reasoning for this was because the window of 6am-11pm and 6am-8pm does not fit into their busy schedule because most are free later in the evenings. They said that if the Rec Center was open 24 hours, we would have more people coming in every day.  After working here for five years I would have to say that since we are not open to the general public but instead only open to the students, faculty, and staff of the Tarleton State University, we would ultimately be losing money if we stayed open 24 hours. To put things into simpler words, even though our numbers might increase, they wouldn’t increase enough to make a profit after all the bills are paid. Another common dislike that was mentioned was not having a smoothie bar. Why don’t we have one yet? Many people who have been to other gyms said that there was a smoothie bar for them to indulge in either before or after a workout. This has been talked about among professional staff, but we already do not have enough workout space so adding a smoothie bar just isn’t feasible. We would have to find a place to put the smoothie bar where everyone can see it in order to maximize profits. Janet Fletcher wrote "Concern about quality of life, physical health, and human development will become even more important in the future. "Recreation will move beyond a narrow focus on activities, buildings, and parks toward a mission of improving the quality of life and environment." (6, p.140). Social agencies will use recreation as a tool to deal with social problems".

After gathering the list of pros/cons, I have concluded that each of these areas

can be improved upon. The only real problem with making additions to the Rec Center would be the money to portion. Once we have a larger influx of patrons coming in, we can then add money to the budget. That money could be used to fund the smaller, more plausible renovations, which in turn could bring even more patrons and raise the percentage of customer satisfaction. This would turn into a domino effect and the Rec Center could potentially add everything that people want. This could also become a problem because with the bigger influx of patrons coming in, there would be a longer list of improvements that needed to be made in order to keep the customer satisfaction up. The Rec Center must be able to evolve and grow, otherwise it will crumble simply because it can not keep up.

Forrester, S. (2014). The Benefits of Campus Recreation. Corvallis, OR: NIRSA.