When the steering committee released its long-awaited report earlier this month, much of the initial focus centered on the radical reforms to the Greek system it proposed.
But the report contained radical ideas in other areas as well -- calling for an enhanced cluster system and first-year only housing.
Today, The Dartmouth continues its three-day look at how other colleges and universities organize their residential life systems.
Yale
Yale's now famous college system began in the 1930s after a large donor requested that the University construct a residential life system modeled after those in the English universities.
As the system functions today, students are randomly assigned to one of 12 colleges, similar to Dartmouth's proposed clusters, prior to matriculation. Although almost the entire freshmen body lives in separate dormitories in a part of campus known as "Old Campus," students remain affiliated with their colleges.
Subsequently, the vast majority of sophomores and juniors live in their colleges, with more seniors preferring alternative living options. A total of 10 percent of the student body chooses off-campus housing, while maintaining college affiliations.
This college system, designed to root students to a particular place and provide them with a small living community, remains popular at Yale.
"The residential college system is a very, very strong part of the students' lives. You have a very diverse community, and that adds to the feeling that it's not an impersonal high rise kind of place," said Yale's Dean of Students Betty Tracktenberg.
Dining, too, is decentralized at Yale. Each college has its own dining facilities, and although not required to do so, most students choose to eat their meals at these locations. Lunches, however, are often consumed at the centrally located cafeteria.
"The food's not great, but it's nice to be able to eat where I live and eat within a community," Yale student Laticia Stein said.
Yale also houses several fraternities and a few sororities that are located off-campus. Although Greek houses are asked to register as undergraduate organizations, they face no university regulation.
"Police have gone into the fraternities when we know that there's a great big party coming up to remind them what the [Connecticut] law is and what the law is about, because most of these places are in residential communities," Tracktenberg said.
On-campus alcohol consumption is permitted, with the exception of beer kegs. If members of a college wish to sponsor a dance and serve alcohol, they are required to hire a university-trained bartender who checks student identifications.
According to Stein, "the majority of parties are in rooms. Frats do throw parties most weekends, but it's not a staple. Most parties here are pretty open."
Princeton
Princeton University is often compared to Dartmouth because of the similarities in rural settings and the schools' sizes.
About 20 years ago, after examining the housing systems of other schools including Harvard and Yale, the university implemented a residential college system " a change from housing freshmen and sophomores in random assignments.
"My sense is that there was a desire to try to create more community within a place that was pretty diffuse," Dean of Undergraduate Students Kathleen Deignan said. "Also, the university was trying to find a way to integrate academic and residential life. Before, it was a pretty separate enterprise."
Deignan added, "It certainly is our impression that it has been a great improvement on the system we had before."
Now, freshmen and sophomores are placed at random into one of the five residential colleges where they are required to live for two years. The residential colleges have their own staffs, including tenured professors, as well as their own dining, movie, photography and exercise facilities. Freshmen seminars, sophomore academic workshops and academic advising all take place within the colleges.
The residential college system did not however eliminate the overwhelming dominant social and residential feature.
Many upperclassmen opt to live in the Prospect Street Eating Clubs, off-campus houses well known for their exclusivity.
Come junior year, 80 percent of students join one of the coeducational eating clubs, privately owned mansions that provide catered dining to students. While admission to some of the houses is based on random lottery, several of them have a selective "bidding" process that resembles rush at Greek houses.
Those students who choose not to join eating clubs can either form co-ops and cook for themselves, or choose an alternate college eating plan.
"I think it's a mixed bag about people being happy with the Eating Clubs," said P.J. Kim, president of the student body. "I think it really depends on who you ask. Because Princeton as a town doesn't have many social options, the Eating Clubs really fill that vacuum."
Indeed, the Eating Clubs house the majority of parties at Princeton. But because they are privately owned facilities, the university exercises no supervision over the alcohol consumption that takes place within them.
"The university's relationship to them is one of collaboration, although we are not tied to them in a governing sense," Deignan said of the regulation policies. "We do hold our students to align themselves with university rules and regulations whether they're on this side of the street or the other side of the street. Our approach, though, is with individual students, not with the clubs themselves."
"The Eating Clubs realize that it's in their best interest to police themselves, so they've really had less problems with the administration than most schools have had," Kim said.
Additionally, many say the Eating Clubs can sometimes have a divisive effect on the student body. While the financial aid office does offer loans to students wishing to live on Prospect Street, it costs about 20 percent more to live in Eating Clubs than in on-campus housing.
"But meals are open, and so are parties," Kim said, acknowledging this source of division. "There probably are stereotypes about some of the clubs, that some of the clubs are more exclusive than others, but that changes year to year."
