Security at Manchester uni. Stopford building

The Stopford building, situated on Oxford road – home to the School of Medicine at The University of Manchester.

In addition to attending to my placement at Wythenshawe hospital, which I do like except it is so out of the way, it’s ridiculous. I mean I have to catch another train or bus to get there... anyway back to my main point, lol. As well as the hospital, the MIB (Manchester interdisciplinary biocentre – very nice place, kitted out with top tech stuff etc) and the John Rylands library, I also go to the Stopford building on a regular basis. My course administrator, my lectures and most of my professors/ lecturers are situated within the building and so I regularly need to see them.

Just one problem I have with the Stopford building, the over the top security system that they have in place. I mean I understand why you have to swipe your student card to get into the library or into restricted areas within the university, but why Stopford? My course administrator told me it was because they apparently store cadavers in the building for our anatomy classes etc and the uni feared that they might get stolen. Which brings me to the question, who in their right minds would steal a cadaver? Also if someone for some bizarre reason did want to steal one, I’m pretty sure somebody would notice as Stopford is quite a busy place and seeing someone drag a dead body along is not a common sight!

Ok so fine, we have the over the top security system... but it would be nice if it would work properly. Having to swipe your card through over and over again is time consuming, highly annoying, makes you late and puts you in a foul mood for the rest of the day. With the ever growing queue behind you and despite numerous swipe card attempts, the barrier still refuses to let you pass. Inevitably you let out an exasperated sigh/ wail/ squeak (whatever it is that you do when your stressed!), which makes the reception staff looks up from their newspapers. They either take pity on you and let you through (thank god!) OR remove you from the queue (Argh!), march you back to the reception desk, grill you on why your card isn’t working (ironically it works fine in the library!), provide some ID (Hello! you have a student card in your hand!) and then finally let you enter the building but extremely late for whatever lecture you were going to or person you were planning to meet.

I usually get away with just looking extremely harassed and so the staff just let me by with no problems, lol. However some of my friends get hassled so much and on a regular basis. I mean how many times do you have to prove that you are in fact a student? Seriously Stopford, sort it out!