Andreas Jeninga/The Hoya The math department’s lease on space in Kober Cogan, where some math professors had their offices, had previously expired.

It doesn’t matter how much multiplying or how many calculations are done, there just isn’t enough space for the math department.

Last Friday, three math department professors with offices in Kober Cogan moved to a copy room turned into a makeshift office in Reiss. They were told three weeks ago that the professors had to vacate the office space by Alexander Heiberger, the associate vice president of operations for Georgetown University Medical Center who manages the leases of the building. The building is owned by edStar, the organization that runs Georgetown University Hospital. The professors had to be out by Oct. 17 and may remain in the copy room until next fall.

Kober Cogan is a hospital building that had allowed the math department to keep its space since MedStar acquired Georgetown University Hospital in 2000. But the space being used was leased to Georgetown by MedStar, Heiberger explained, and was mostly used as space for then-Provost Dorothy M. Brown. The provost’s office moved out of Kober Cogan when the lease expired in December 2001.

But Heiberger said “no one had told us in the interim that the math department was still using that space.”

Heiberger said MedStar informed him that offices were still being used, though the lease had expired and that MedStar would need the space. “Basically, it was an oversight,” Heiberger said. When asked to leave, he said, the math department was responsive and cooperative.

The three math professors will join the other math offices in the Reiss Science Building, but having to move to a smaller room in the middle of the semester is causing a bit of a stir.

“If you were to include both rooms from Kober Cogan (B-04 and B-06), as well as the back room in B-04, I’d say that the supply/copy room space is roughly one-quarter the size of the previous space,” mathematics professor David Caraballo said. “At the moment, a lot of our stuff is in the hallway, but it is my hope that , soon, the former copy room will simply look like a shared office.”

In general, available campus space for students, faculty and staff has been an ongoing concern at the university.

Heiberger said it’s public knowledge that “MedStar would like to tear [Kober Cogan] down and make it a physicians’ office.” MedStar officials could not be reached by press time. Originally, the Kober Cogan space was supposed to be a temporary location for the math department until more space became available.

“I do not think anyone felt that housing the Math Department Annex in Kober Cogan was a permanent solution, as it left our department divided,” Caraballo said.

Andrew Vogt, chair of the mathematics department, hopes the new housing situation in the copy room will not be the same way.

“But `temporary’ has a way of becoming `permanent’ unless those who allocate space are reminded constantly of the need,” Vogt said.

Though the new space in Reiss is convenient in that all the members are housed together, Vogt admits, it is less convenient in other ways. “We will lose the copier room, also used for other clerical work by our faculty and by students for tutoring and internet access,” he said.

Vogt explained “the clerical work we and our one-person administrative staff do will have to be performed in other inadequate space.”

The copy machine and other office equipment will be moved into the hallway, a public space, and won’t be in a separate room, Vogt noted.

And the move isn’t just inconvenient because of the space, but also because of the timing, Caraballo said.

“I am glad the department will be together but am concerned that this all happened mid-semester,” he said. “My chief concern is trying to minimize the impact for my 73 students.”

In efforts to work out the best office locations possible, Caraballo said that the university and math department officials have been working to find “a reasonable, long-term solution that addresses the math department’s current and future space needs.”

But it is not just math department who needs space. Other departments and members of the campus community need it as well.

“Every one on campus is competing for space, and the one who squawks loudest will likely get it,” Vogt said. “My hope is that the powers that be will come up with an equitable solution, perhaps by getting an objective party to make a recommendation.”