After receiving a working proposal for gender-neutral housing on Tuesday, Dean of Residential Life Martin Redman confirmed during a discussion hosted by Palaeopitus Thursday that such housing will likely be available Fall term.
"Gender-neutral" means students can room with any other student, regardless of sex.
"This isn't the greatest environment for students who don't fit with what some might call the norm," Redman said at the discussion. "This isn't the most comfortable place in the world for students who aren't straight or who don't identify in that fashion. We're catching up."
Student Body President Tim Andreadis '07, who began discussing the possibility of gender-neutral housing at the College in 2004, said that such housing would better accommodate the needs of transgender, gay and lesbian students, but also emphasized that this initiative would benefit the student body as a whole.
"On a very broad level it's really not about the GLBT population," Andreadis said. "Individuals should be able to live with whomever they desire regardless of gender."
Some concerns raised about gender-neutral housing, such as issues of sexual assault, can be countered by the apparent success of housing in coed fraternities, which represent a current gender-neutral housing option at Dartmouth, said a student at the discussion who identfied as a member of a coed fraternity.
Giavanna Munafo, associate director for training and educational programs, said that offering gender-neutral housing on campus could educate the Dartmouth community about issues of gender and identity of which they may be unaware.
The current proposal suggests designating certain floors of residential halls as gender-neutral, allowing the residents to facilitate discussions and programming around issues of gender identity.
Other gender-neutral housing would be available on floors not entirely designated as gender-neutral with no programming component involved.
These rooms, which could include apartments in Maxwell, Channing Cox or East Wheelock, would be chosen to provide students with a high level of privacy.
For both types of gender-neutral housing, suites, two room doubles and singles would be the most likely configurations. No one room doubles would be offered, and bathrooms would also continue to be single sex.
Redman said that while he supported the concept of the initiative many details remain to be finalized.
"[A plan for] the implementation certainly is lacking because that's not what [members of the task force] spent their time dealing with," Redman said. "We have some time to deal with the implementation strategy."
One practical concern would be whether students interested in gender-neutral housing would be placed based solely by request or if these students would have to undergo an application process, although the criteria that would be used to evaluate a student's application remains unclear.
A further complication is how to make this housing option available to freshmen. If a student is under 18 years old, the law requires that a guardian sign the student's housing agreement and application, which may pose a problem for students who would prefer gender-neutral housing but may not wish to discuss issues of gender and identity with their parents.
"How can we assist students who are in the entering class who may be interested in the kinds of offerings we may be making in gender-neutral housing and at the same time protect their privacy?" Redman asked.
Because of these concerns and the College's desire for freshmen to live in all-freshmen communities, Redman said the current proposal focuses primarily on returning students.
Redman said that many of these practical concerns could be addressed by learning from other institutions which already offer gender-neutral housing, such as the University of California Riverside.
The proposed housing option in the fall would begin on a fairly small scale, but should students demonstrate interest, Redman said there would be room for expansion in later years.
"I think we can certainly provide the option in a reasonable and fairly satisfactory way, but it probably won't satisfy everyone's particular need," Redman said. "Certainly in the first year anyway."
Palaeopitus is charged with representing the student body to administrators and fostering discussion among campus groups.
