2008 Woodie Awards
Housing reform prompts sharp criticism
Brian Fung
Issue date: 4/24/08 Section: News
Complaints about the College's annual room draw process have spiked in recent weeks as an unusually high number of rising juniors and seniors failed to secure their preferred housing options for the next academic year. Students and administration officials attributed the housing difficulties in part to the College's unanticipated over-enrollment troubles that came with the Class of 2011.
The latest housing squeeze also comes amid the most striking change to affect the College residential system since the introduction of the five commons - Atwater, Brainerd, Cook, Ross and Wonnacott - in 1998. After announcing last fall that planned expansions of on-campus residential options would be suspended in favor of financial aid and faculty development, College officials have sought to provide upperclassmen with equal access to the best housing while mandating that first-years and sophomores remain geographically segregated by their commons to preserve the commons experience.
That decision effectively extinguished any short-term prospects for fleshing out the commons system, which initially hoped to give each commons its own dining hall and residential cluster. That policy has now been replaced by the new, so-called "4/2 Commons" system unveiled by Dean of the College Tim Spears in 2007.
Among other provisions, the 4/2 system calls for housing all rising sophomores together by commons. But last year's unexpected influx of matriculates for the Class of 2011 has sent the College scrambling to reserve virtually entire residence halls for rising sophomores, displacing upperclassmen who would have otherwise inhabited those halls. Room draw spaces were further limited this spring by the loss of other housing options such as Porter House due to "facilities issues," according to Residential Coordinator Karin Hall-Kolts.
"[Carr Hall] would have been another 11 beds," said Hall-Kolts. "Every bed starts to count, and you start adding them up and you realize, 'oh, boy, it's going to be tight this year.'"
The latest housing squeeze also comes amid the most striking change to affect the College residential system since the introduction of the five commons - Atwater, Brainerd, Cook, Ross and Wonnacott - in 1998. After announcing last fall that planned expansions of on-campus residential options would be suspended in favor of financial aid and faculty development, College officials have sought to provide upperclassmen with equal access to the best housing while mandating that first-years and sophomores remain geographically segregated by their commons to preserve the commons experience.
That decision effectively extinguished any short-term prospects for fleshing out the commons system, which initially hoped to give each commons its own dining hall and residential cluster. That policy has now been replaced by the new, so-called "4/2 Commons" system unveiled by Dean of the College Tim Spears in 2007.
Among other provisions, the 4/2 system calls for housing all rising sophomores together by commons. But last year's unexpected influx of matriculates for the Class of 2011 has sent the College scrambling to reserve virtually entire residence halls for rising sophomores, displacing upperclassmen who would have otherwise inhabited those halls. Room draw spaces were further limited this spring by the loss of other housing options such as Porter House due to "facilities issues," according to Residential Coordinator Karin Hall-Kolts.
"[Carr Hall] would have been another 11 beds," said Hall-Kolts. "Every bed starts to count, and you start adding them up and you realize, 'oh, boy, it's going to be tight this year.'"
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Ann Minton
posted 4/24/08 @ 11:18 AM EST
It seems to me that room draw has become overly complex at MIDD. Something is terribly wrong when super-seniors don't have priority. Period. My sympathies go out to all 08. (Continued…)
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