Are administrative offices at Dartmouth set up to help or hinder students? Well for $30,000 a year, you'd figure that they would be set up to coddle their Ivy League students through these first few years of living away from home. After two years, and $60,000, I now realize that they are basically set up to make your life as difficult as possible, for a reason that I have yet to figure out. Let me tell you a story, and you can make up your mind.
I have a friend, let us call him John. (The names of this story have been changed to protect the innocent, but not the guilty). At the end of spring term, John went to see his room for the summer and realized that although the suite was all seniors, his room for the summer was unoccupied. Seeing this, John was happy because he figured that he could store his stuff there over interim and avoid the incredible hassle that controlled or uncontrolled storage entails. I mean to be packing and unpacking all of your belongings every 10 weeks is one hell of a pain, as we all know.
John figured that since it was a senior suite and his room was free, that all he'd have to do was ask the Office of Residential Life and they would let him store his stuff. Oh yeah, before I go on, I forgot to mention that John has Cerebral Palsy. He has a very minor case, in fact, I had known him for about two terms, and I hadn't even noticed it, until he told me. This disability has absolutely zero significance in his daily life.
So John went down to ORL, told them of his situation, and asked if he could store his stuff in his room. "Absolutely not!" was ORL's response. This was impossible, impractical and against regulations. John asked why -- there was no one in the room now, no one over interim, and it would just make his life a lot easier if he could move his stuff in now. "I'm sorry, we can't help you," was their response.
John decided to try a slightly different track, just to see if he could finally get a break. He told Rosenblum about his disability, Cerebral Palsy, and said he had a friend who could help move his stuff today only, and it would be really difficult for him to move it any other day, or to move it more than once. John described the change as like night and day. Suddenly Lynn Rosenblum popped out and said John could definitely move his stuff out right away. She immediately called someone to get a key for him and asked if he needed any extra help. John was startled, but at least he had found a way to get his stuff moved.
This encounter deeply disturbed both John, myself, and I assume anyone that's bothered to read this far. I mean, if it was possible for John to store his things in this room all along, why did ORL only allow him to after finding out about his disability?
John, like most people with small physical handicaps, does not want special treatment, just to be treated like you and me, the same. Yet, why did he have to use his special status in this instance? It changed nothing. The room was still empty. Everyone was still better off allowing John to move his stuff in. Why only after being forced to reveal personal details, would ORL change its mind?
Here is my answer, take it for what it's worth. The people in charge of services -- ORL, the Registrar, DarTalk, etc. -- have no desire to aid or assist any students. For some strange reason, they seem to enjoy making our lives more difficult.
It is as if they are the dictators of their own little sphere, and once you enter it, you are at their command. However, as soon as there is some circumstance where a dean or administrator might reverse these people's decisions, they will become your best friend. For example, what if ORL had denied John, and then he went to a dean and explained everything, including his handicap. We both know that someone in ORL would have been yelled at, and John would have gotten his way. However had no handicap been mentioned, the dean would probably have said, "that's between you and ORL."
It is sad and troublesome to realize that the College is being run like this. It is deeply disturbing to realize that at Dartmouth your trouble is of no concern to anyone else. For some reason, this atmosphere tends to bring out the worst in people. In my two years here, I have yet to see any staff member in a position of power cut a student a break, unless they are afraid of being rebuked from above. Come on people, let's all be nice. How are students supposed to form a community at Dartmouth, when the staff makes them feel like helpless outsiders?
