On Friday, March 26 Jennifer Self, CSU Bakersfield’s director of public affairs, sent an email to students with protocol on refunds. Students will be receiving credit to their student accounts in the area of housing, dining, and parking. 

  Students who are CSUB residents will be receiving credit for the amount of days left in the semester left from the day they checked out of the residence halls. CSUB residents will also be receiving the difference of their dining services. 

  Next week, CSUB students who purchased a parking pass for the  Spring 2020 semester will be receiving 50% of the $93 it cost to purchase CSUB’s permit. 

  Students will be able to view the amount of credit on their students accounts on the mycsub website. 

  Drexler Alcantara, a graduate student majoring in educational counseling, is concerned about students not receiving more money back from the school, due to the closure of the campus.  

  “Student should at least get a partial refund from the SRC. Students can simply go on the internet/social media (i.e. Google, YouTube, Instagram, etc.) for at home workouts, if that’s what they’re charging the rest of our money for. Students like myself, worked hard to pay for services like the SRC, and not being able to use what we paid for “most out of our own pockets” is simply not right,” Alcantara wrote in response to a Facebook post. 

  Alcantara is speaking up for fellow students as well. He wrote in his comment that for students who worked hard to earn the money to pay off these mandatory fees, getting that money back could go towards essential needs for themselves and/or their families.  

  Chase Gause, a CSUB senior majoring in psychology, believes that paying for access to the SRC should be optional rather than connected to tuition. 

  “I think having an opt-in for SRC access rather than a hidden fee built into tuition would be nice, as I imagine a large portion of the student body don’t even use it. It would be good to get a refund separately for the gym since we don’t have access to that service anymore,” Gause wrote in response to a Facebook post. 

  Eileen Díaz, a CSUB senior majoring in history, believes that receiving a partial refund is better than receiving nothing. 

  “In the grand scheme of things, that partial refund is better than nothing. However, there are some students who have had to take loans out and find other means of paying for those resources, and a partial refund may not be exactly fair. Considering we switched to online delivery halfway through the semester, a partial refund seems fair,” Díaz responded to the Facebook post. 

Self assured that if the credit results in a refund owed to the students, that refund will be processed in the following week and sent to the students based on the information provided to the Student Financial Services. 

  “This has been an uncertain time for everyone as we navigate truly unprecedented circumstances. But CSU Bakersfield puts the needs of our students above all else,” Self wrote in an email.