Undergraduate Education and Student Affairs
Arthur C. Smith
Dean for Undergraduate Education and Student Affairs
Room 7-133, 77 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139 (617)253-6776
President Vest has asked me to make specific arrangements so that there will be opportunity for all concerned parties to take part in discussions of plans for student housing. As part of those arrangements, I want to present a clear timetable for decision-making and action. I need your help in making this process effective and insuring that we address the concerns that have been expressed regarding the process for reaching decisions.
The senior officers of the Institute have received many thoughtful communications from students, alumni, faculty and staff regarding the renovation of Senior House, overcrowding of undergraduate housing and the future form and location of graduate housing. The report of the Strategic Housing Planning Committee has been circulated and we have received substantial response to its recommendations and findings. We have read the reports from the Ashdown House Executive Committee, the Graduate Student Council and the Senior House/East Campus Action Committee and have studied the information obtained from surveys by the Graduate Student Council and the Undergraduate Association. There is substantial agreement in the community on some aspects of the general issues involved and based on this agreement, we propose that we divide our considerations and discussions into three separate parts. These would be:
This separation seems reasonable to us since different groups of students may wish to be involved in different issues and the timetable for decisions differs for the various issues.
I will schedule an open meeting for each of these topics. It will be the purpose of each meeting to establish areas of general agreement, define areas which need further discussion and to make plans for further discussion and decisions. Meetings on the first two topics should occur in early February in order to meet the need for timely decisions; the third meeting may occur somewhat later since it deals with longer range issues. Your input on location and timing of these initial meetings is urgently desired.
The paragraphs below summarize our present thinking based on the input we have received on each of these issues. I have tried to be as concrete as I can in order to focus discussion but it is important to realize that specific decisions will not be made until the open meetings have been held.
There is widespread agreement that renovation of Senior House should proceed promptly. We have made the decision to begin work this summer on those aspects of renovation that do not depend on the details of the final design. We have also generated some planning assumptions which seem to us to be in accord with much of the input that we have received and we offer them as the basis for discussion at the open meeting. These assumptions may be modified as a result of that discussion and we would expect to convert them from assumptions to decisions soon after that meeting.
A. Senior House will be closed during the summer of 1995 when asbestos will be removed and some general replacement of utilities and services can occur. Senior House will re-open for undergraduate occupancy for the fall term 1995. The exact dates of closing and reopening and the availability of storage for personal belongings need to be determined as soon as possible. No construction activities which would interfere with student life will occur during the fall or spring terms. Minor construction may be planned during IAP 1996 but will not require students to vacate the house and will be coordinated with student activity. Acquisition of major items needed for the renovation will take place during the 1995-96 academic year; it may be necessary to store some of them on-site in Senior House. Senior House will close during the summer of 1996 and renovation will be carried out using multiple shift efforts as necessary to complete work so that the house can be re-occupied in a timely manner for the fall term 1996. Presumably no storage space will be available in the house during that summer.
B. Senior House will continue to house undergraduates after the renovation. While plans for renovation should allow for flexibility in long term use or alternative summer use, the basic assumption is that Senior House will house undergraduates and renovations should be designed with that as the goal.
If the proposed schedule is to be met, detailed plans must be produced as soon as possible. A core group of students, faculty and staff will work with members of the administration and the architect to specify the goals of the renovation, and to create the final plans. Individuals will need to be selected to carry out this role. As renovation plans are evolved and decisions are made by the administration, they will be shared with the broader community concerned with Senior House.
Based upon the input we have received, we believe it is possible to carry on constructive discussions about use of some spaces (of the order of 50) which now house graduate students to relieve the potential overcrowding in undergraduate housing. We believe that this can be done without harmful effect on the graduate student community and can produce a good undergraduate experience for those who would live there. Use of a portion of Ashdown House to house undergraduates is the most likely possibility but other opportunities can be considered. These discussions need to proceed quickly enough to allow implementation in the fall of 1995.
There are several factors which have emerged from the input we have received to date about future graduate student housing. The Institute is committed to supplying more housing for graduate students. The opportunity to do that depends on a number c factors, e.g. the availability of land which is zoned for residence, the availability of financial resources, the degree of need for additional capacity, etc.. Graduate students have a number of concerns which should be addressed in planning new graduate housing or modification of current housing, e.g. location, safety, establishment of community, priority for occupancy, facilities, etc. There may be opportunity for including faculty housing as a component when changes in graduate student housing are contemplated.
It will be the task of the open meeting on this subject to exchange information and to develop an agenda so that concrete planning for graduate/faculty housing can occur. Substantial progress on such an agenda is expected by the end of the spring term so that plans for construction could begin to evolve during the summer and fall.
Scanned, OCRed, and converted to hypertext, 3 Feb 1995, by Jeremy Hylton.