Each fall, the move-in frenzy looks much the same at Dartmouth: overstuffed cars idling in front of residence halls, door alarms beeping incessantly while propped open for hours, men and women trucking their belongings into their new dorm rooms. Except this year, for the first time, those Dartmouth men and women might be moving into the same rooms.
The Office of Residential Life, which announced its new gender-neutral housing program last spring in response to student demand, will closely monitor the project this fall and spend much of Winter term trying to improve coed rooming options for next year.
Rising upperclassmen had two ways to take advantage of the new housing option at last spring's annual room draw: They could choose any of the 57 multi-room apartments or suites available during, most of which are located in the East Wheelock cluster, or apply to the "gender-neutral" program floor, located on the ground level of the McLane Hall.
"It is my hope that the program floor will be a vibrant community that helps the campus engage in conversations about our understanding of gender identity and gender stereotyping," said Rachael Class-Giguere, director of undergraduate housing. "When we created the floor our fundamental focus was that the students on the floor should be the ones to define their goals."
While ORL was inundated with applications for the 16 rooms on the gender-neutral program floor, netting twice as many applicants as there were spots, only 13 out of the 57 designated coed apartments and suites will be occupied by coed groups.
"While some students want a mixed gender roommate experience, that is not true for all students," Class-Giguere said. "When you look at other schools with a gender neutral housing option, you will see that our numbers are pretty much in line with theirs. This is not a housing choice for everyone, but it definitely meets a need for others."
ORL will use quantitative data, focus groups and individual conversations with students to judge the success of the program at the College this fall.
"It will be easier to assess the [gender-neutral] floor as we already have quantitative data -- we had twice as many applicants than we had spaces for," said Marty Redman, dean of residential life. "As we work with students, we will be able to see if [the program] met their needs."
Redman mentioned that web surveys might also be used to help ORL gauge student interest and determine things like whether two floors of coed living spaces are needed, or perhaps a whole residence hall.
"We want to know from students, is this something you were not interested in this year but may be interested in next year?" he said. "Students are pretty vocal here about stuff so I don't think we will have a hard time getting a handle on what we need."
Incoming freshmen did not have the option to participate in gender-neutral housing this fall, which Redman said was a matter of recognizing students' privacy and parents' legal rights. Many incoming freshmen are under the age of 18 and therefore require their parents' signatures on the housing contract.
To alleviate the issue, ORL included space on the freshmen housing applications for interested students to provide their contact information so that members of the ORL staff could directly contact them and discuss any concerns or special needs they had
"We did have students who contacted us and the housing staff worked with them individually to find housing that worked," Redman said, adding that often the best solution was to place those freshmen in single rooms.
Class-Giguere said she is optimistic about the program and hopes to expand the types of rooms offered either next year or the year after so that there will be more options outside of East Wheelock.
"I expect it to grow. I'd be surprised if it didn't," Redman said.
