No one ever looks forward to taking summer classes, but they are a necessary evil for those who want to get ahead or catch up. What is not necessary, but only evil, are the tons of fees we have to pay; fees for which we do not even enjoy the benefits because we are either taking online classes and thus not on campus, or benefits which are not offered during the summer.

As a college student who watches every dime she spends, it was very disheartening looking at the overwhelming amount of student fees I had to pay for only one summer class, fees for things I wouldn’t even be utilizing.

Don’t get me wrong, I am a strong believer that students should have to pay for things like athletics, parking and intramural sports, to only name a few, because we do take advantage of them during the school year. These fees are necessary to give back to the university. At the same time, I believe paying such fees should benefit us as well because we deserve to enjoy what we pay for.

For instance, I’m paying an intramural fee, but there are no intramurals during the summer. Even if there were summer intramural competitions, it would not be possible because most students taking summer classes don’t have the time to go out and play sports for fun, let alone if there were even enough students to begin with. 

An even more frustrating fact is those who only take online summer classes still have to pay for parking among other on campus facilities. It is obvious they won’t need parking if the class is 100 percent online. Why do we have to pay for something we won’t even use? We might as well be throwing away money. 

Some argue these are fees that will help the university and that I will see the advantages when I enroll for my fall or spring semesters. This argument doesn’t hold up because I still pay these exact fees when I enroll. The only difference is I have the choice to get my money’s worth during the regular semesters, such as free entry to football games, access to various events put on by the university and free tickets to the plays and concerts. During the summer, it’s pretty much dead, meaning there are no sports games, concerts and plays to enjoy or activities to do around campus.

I feel it is unfair to the students to have to pay for things that we don’t even see during the summer. There is a right and wrong time to charge fees such as these. Unfortunately, the summer is not the right time. We should only have to pay for facilities available to us during the summer.