What started as a stockpile of over a thousand fresh, fluffy towels has now dwindled down to zero: vanished into backpacks, lockers, and the abyss of dorm rooms. An honor system of “take one, then bring it back” was misused and now remains an inconvenience to many gym-goers trying to take a shower.
According to Corey Paolillo, Borden’s equipment manager, the towels were never formally removed—they simply never came back. Students would grab them, stash them in their lockers, take them to away games, or even bring them back to dorms, leaving the equipment room’s stock to dwindle from 1,000 to zero in just over a year.
“I started five years ago, and it was more like you would hand in a dirty one and there would be someone standing at the door [who] would give you a clean one,” said Paolillo. “When this mass volume of students are looking for stuff, [it’s] not really sustainable to stand there and deal with clean and dirty towels all day. So, we just put them in the corner of the front of the room. It was an honor system, where you take one and drop it off [later], but I guess they would take the clean ones and not drop them off. So, it’s just piled up in an abyss of missing towels,” said Paolillo.
Jonathan Oh ’27 commented that the disappearance of the towels was likely caused by students stockpiling them for personal use. He explained that individuals would take multiple towels during restocking periods and store them in their lockers, gradually depleting the shared supply.
“Something a lot of people do is since they know the towels in Borden are popular and in demand, and a lot of people use them after they shower, they tend to take extra towels when they restock in the equipment room and store them in their lockers for when they need them. It’s a good idea if you’re the only one that knows it, a secret method, but once everyone starts doing it, it becomes a problem,” said Oh.
He added that this behavior created a collective action problem when adopted widely. Oh noted that while proper towel return would solve the issue, changing these habits in the boys’ locker room remains unlikely in the foreseeable future.
“If everyone were to responsibly use their towels and return them, we wouldn’t have this problem. The equipment room staff, Corey and Randy, are really good at washing towels and putting them back. If everyone just collectively used their towels and returned them as soon as they were done, that’s the ideal situation. But in the boys’ locker room, that’s probably not going to happen in the near future.”
Cora Rodgers ’27, an athlete who uses the gym every day stated her disappointment at the situation. She added that students should bring the towels back.
“Well, a week ago I just thought they were out so I tried to get one because I was going to shower. I don’t really know what’s going on and why they’re not there…[the problem] is kind of annoying. Return your towels please,” said Rodgers.
