The College aims to shift to a housing model that will resemble a "house system" in the next two years, Board of Trustees chair Steve Mandel '78 said in an email Friday morning. This project seeks to stabilize students’ residential experience, he said.
The new system will allow students to live in a designated residential cluster after freshman year.Currently, students spend their first three terms on a dedicated freshman floor and then choose upper-class housing through a lottery system, often moving each term.
This change adds onto residential initiatives announced winter term, including themed communities that will begin this fall.The new programs aim to foster community and a “a dorm-based sense of identity” among students, Mandel said.
Director of residential education Mike Wooten had introduced a “neighborhoods” residential model at a February “Moving Dartmouth Forward” event that focused on housing. The office of residential life hopes to renovate existing buildings to equalize housing quality, Wooten had said.
The College hired Lisa Hogarty as its vice president for campus planning in February. She previously worked at Harvard University, where she led an initiative that aimed to create a more welcoming campus by developing communal gathering areas.
Planned housing changes, Mandel said, can help bolster community on campus, but he said that this step is not enough to change harmful student behaviors.
He cited new changes to campus investigation of sexual assault charges as another step, but he called for a “community-wide conversation about changes to social norms on campus.”
“Quite simply, social norms need to change and harmful behaviors need to stop,” he said in the email.“Sexual assault is completely unacceptable.”
In the email, Mandel spoke to the College’s plans for other areas of campus life.
As part of its focus on experiential learning, the College intends to launch several new interdisciplinary programs like the master’s of health care delivery science degree in the next few years, Mandel said.
Citing the 14 percent decline in undergraduate applicants as “an important wake-up call,” Mandel said the College is re-examining its financial aid policies, outreach to applicants and student interests.
Mandel also mentioned changes to the 2014-15 budget, which comprised a reallocation of expenses to new student and faculty initiatives andlower tuition growth than past years. Tuition will be $61,947 next year.
