|
|
Residential Life Goes West •
Chewing on Evolution
•
Atmospheric Ambiguities
Lobsters Play Biological Violins
• Remembering
Wannamaker
When is a Platypus Not a Kangaroo?
• Solution
for Smokers •
In Brief
|
Residential
Life Goes West
 uke
trustees approved three key changes to current residential-life policy
aimed at improving undergraduate life on the university’s main
campus. The resolution, adopted at the trustees’ quarterly campus
meeting in May, calls for moving all sophomores to West Campus by
2006, initiating links between designated East Campus and West Campus
residence halls, and reconfiguring residential space on West Campus
to create a central corridor of independent housing while moving fraternities
and selective dormitories to outer quadrangles.
The shifts in residential-life policy stem from a task
force convened by President Nannerl O. Keohane in the spring of 2000
to address campus-climate issues. Significant modifications planned
for West Campus architecture, including the new 350-bed West-Edens
Link dormitory scheduled to open in the fall of 2002 and the renovation
of main- campus residence halls through the spring of 2006, prompted
the task force to place particular emphasis on that campus’ residential
life.
The task force’s report, released in February, recommended
the three changes as part of a comprehensive effort “to make
West Campus look more like the student body as a whole” and “to
achieve a campus climate that will respect the diverse lifestyles
that exist among students, ensure fair treatment of all groups, and
build traditions of continuity and community” in campus housing.
“I think the driving force of the report is to create
a coherent and consistent plan for Duke’s residential life,”
said William Chafe, vice provost for undergraduate education and task
force chair, when the report was submitted to the board of trustees’
Student Affairs Committee. “We boast about our commitment to
diversity. We need to support that goal in terms of our housing options.”
The residential experience for freshmen “has been
a stunning success” since the 1995-96 initiative to house all
first-year students on East Campus, according to the task-force report.
Freshman classes develop cohesion and unity, crossing racial and ethnic
lines, by sharing a common living experience.
But “that sense of community begins to fragment”
in the second semester of freshman year, the report states. That is
when first-year students begin looking for housing space on West Campus,
often by rushing a fraternity or selective house, and trying to avoid
an assignment to Trent Drive Hall, “a symbol of second-class
housing” for the more than 300 sophomores who end up living there.
The current residential distribution of students produces
“a serious demographic imbalance,” especially along racial
and ethnic lines, on West Campus, according to the task force. While
31 percent of students living on East Campus are minorities, that
figure dips to 25 percent of main West Campus residents and to 10
percent of fraternities. In addition, some female students have complained
of “not feeling comfortable” when walking along main West.
“The result is that West Campus residential life
is today far less representative of the diversity of the Duke student
body than is the case on East Campus,” the report notes.
The recommended changes in residential-life policies are
part of a comprehensive effort begun by Duke administrators in the
mid-1990s to develop a more academically and socially engaged academic
community. Following the inception of the all-first-year East Campus,
attention turned to establishing a new undergraduate liberal-arts
curriculum. Curriculum 2000, adopted in January 1999, is designed
to foster depth and breadth of knowledge by developing critical thinking,
problem solving, and other traditional skills of liberal education.
Last spring, the Arts and Sciences and Engineering faculty councils
met jointly to begin promoting an increased campus focus on academic-integrity
issues.
All three of these efforts, including the residential-life
changes, “are consistent with goals outlined in ‘Building
on Excellence’ [the university strategic plan adopted in February],
including goals of promoting diversity in all aspects of university
life and nurturing the personal and intellectual growth of students
by building community in social, civic, and academic realms,”
says the resolution adopted by the board of trustees.
|
|
