If there is one time to never go to Kessel, it’s during common hour or between the time 12-1:15pm during the week. Just from personal experience I have learned that it could take up to an hour just to get my food. I try to stay away from Kessel during common hour but today I have decided to observe common hour as a part of my field notes study.
During common hour there are a lot of activities going on in Kessel because It’s the one time throughout the day that everyone has off. As you walk in to Kessel before walking into the dining area you can find a bunch of long tables that are set up with sororities, fraternities and other organizations trying to raise money by selling baked goods. Sometimes there are official events going on during common hour such as career spotlights and club fairs. You will know when these events are going on based off of the flash flushes that are located in the Kessel bathrooms as well as their huge pin board just outside the Dining hall. This pin board has ALL the activities going on throughout the month in Kessel. The most interesting one that I found was a sign by the Latin American Student Organization who will be running an event on 10/23 called “Fear Factor” which will showcase different flavored crickets! Some other events on the board include movie night, sports marketing career spotlight and game night.
On October 22, 2018 I decided to observe Kessel during common hour. As I walked in I wasn’t surprised by the abundance amount of people that I ran into, as soon as I stepped foot into Kessel everything was the same as my last observation except there was quadruple the amount of people. All the athletic teams were sitting in the same exact spot including but not limited to the football team against the wall, the basketball team at the round table as well as the baseball team who also sat at the high top tables near field hockey. This is the most important thing about kessel because it emphasizes the the social hierarchy still exists even though some people say its supposed to end in high school. While I continued to observe everyone in Kessel, it seemed as if the Football team was above everyone else at least that’s what they think. I noticed multiple football players cutting the extremely long lines having conversations with the Chefs to get them to make their food right away 
instead of waiting on line like everybody else.
The biggest event going on in Kessel on Monday was a career talk hosted by the Business Association Club. Because of this event there was a lot of people that were dressed up in business casual attire to attend the career event, this was a chance where students could expand their networking connections. Even though this event was going on there was still a ton of smaller events happening especially the baked goods sale and sock drive. Kessel is a great place to meet up with clubs in between classes. It also serves as a great social place for everyone to go hangout.
The focus of todays observation was to see the interactions between all the students in Kessel as well as how long people stood in line for. I observed one girl who stood in line for 45 minutes… Common Hour is the loudest and largest amount of people together at once at the same time. One thing I’m starting to see a trend in is some of the athletic teams tend to sit around for a while well the non athletes tend not to stick around in Kessel unless they are attending a special event.
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