The HUB-Robeson Center forms arguably one of the most recognizable landmarks on campus to the typical Penn State student. From eating food to attending club meetings and seminars to simply studying here, the HUB does it all. Not to mention, the lawn hosts events and activities at least once a week and inside its doors numerous stands are set up aiming at getting people to attend an event, join a club, or simply be aware of an occurrence. Thousands of people walk through the HUB daily, adding to the bustling environment and slight chaos that comes to everyone’s mind when people mention the HUB (besides the expensive name-brand meal places that suck the LionCash out of their account too).
The HUB is in the mid-southern section of campus, walk a block over and you reach Old Main, walk a block up from there and you come upon the Library. The HUB is a convenient location for most science students, landing right in the center of a majority of the science buildings, and students who live downtown off campus, being a pit stop between the walk from campus to the numerous downtown apartments and houses.
The HUB offers several different areas to study, entering the glass doors on the first floor of the hub there are benches and tables lined up end-to-end that students congregate at to eat, socialize, and study. However, these are probably some of the loudest and most crowded places to study in the HUB.
Leading from the first floor to the second floor are the iconic High School Musical steps that people love to gather around and relive their elementary school fantasies. Yet these steps, too, are always crowded; a common theme in the HUB. They also offer no real table or anyplace to put your materials besides laying them down on the step around you, forming a rather uncomfortable and inconvenient study location.
On the second floor, there are numerous areas of comfortable chairs and side tables, some that look down onto the first floor and others that simply stare at the other chairs and people studying there. Off in a corner is an area of true tables and chairs but these tables are small and it is rare to find an unoccupied one, even at 8:00 at night.
Finally, on the third floor (and my personal favorite spot) are more comfortable chairs that overlook the first and second floors from behind a glass wall, muffling the roar from down below and providing an other-worldly almost god-like viewing experience. Here, it is also crowded although probably the easiest area to find chairs because it is not immediately accessible from the outside, you have to walk up an industrial stairwell that’s hidden in the HUB. It is typically a quiet atmosphere and therefore I find myself getting the most work done there.
Overall, I find myself revisiting the third floor of the HUB mostly because of its convenience. It closely mimics the quiet environments i focus best in, however if I have more time on my hands I will typically go find a different place to study just so I don’t have to deal with the hassle of crowded people in the bottom floors and the distractions that come with walking through these floors (such as the delightful smell of food).