As reported in Student Life, the University recently unveiled a state-of-the-art sports performance center (SPC). This is a much needed and well deserved addition to campus. Vice Chancellor Dr. Anna Gonzalez and Chancellor Dr. Andrew Martin have celebrated this new center of “healthy excellence” and I applaud their vision in creating such a facility. I have been fortunate to work with some of our Division III athletes as they study and work on projects in computer science. They are among our most dedicated and disciplined students, and this new facility will hopefully serve them well, training them not only to excel in their sports, but also to prevent injury.

Unfortunately for its faculty and staff, the University has not shown this level of generosity in providing a free exercise facility for its employees. As a faculty member of over 30 years, and an avid workout enthusiast, I began to use the Washington University open workout facilities when I arrived. In 1991, that much smaller facility was actually shared by faculty, staff, students, and all sports teams. It was modestly equipped and very crowded compared to both the Sumers Recreation Center and the new SPC, but it was available at no cost to faculty and staff. 

A community of early morning workout people developed in that facility. If one of us didn’t show up for a few days, an email might be received checking on that person’s health. When Sumers opened in Fall 2016, we gladly moved upstairs and into the beautiful, new space. The University is now charging faculty and staff $200 a year to use the new facility. When I visited the then-director of the center, he told me the center was more like a health club, so the University felt justified in charging for membership. I pointed out that health clubs had free parking and did not close during semester breaks. The availability of the center improved, and I had to park on campus anyway, so I was happily a regular member there until it closed due to COVID-19 in 2020.

Sumers did eventually reopen for our students, but not for our faculty or staff for over a year. I personally appealed to Provost Dr. Beverly Wendland and our School of Engineering drafted a resolution, asking her to make the facility available to faculty and staff for the good of our physical and mental health. The University was unmoved by those pleas, and so my colleagues and I found gyms elsewhere. By trading down from a red parking permit and joining the Center of Clayton, I save $1000 a year (and the University loses about $1600 from me a year), so there is no financial incentive for me to return, even now that employees are again able to pay to use the facility.

Here is my point: such a facility should not only be available and free to employees, there should be incentives in place to encourage its regular use. A healthy workforce is in the University’s best interest. Exercise boosts the immune system, regulates mood favorably, and helps prevent injury. This is surely known by a university with a top-11 medical school. 

When I was working out at Sumers, I would regularly see Professor William Pickard, advanced in years even then, but still coming almost daily to the gym. He would greet me by saying, “A healthy mind in a healthy body,” translated from the Latin phrase. He was right. We should make Sumers freely available to all employees.