Programmatic Review of Program Houses

Earlier this year Campus Life launched a review of our residential program houses, a process each academic unit experiences every seven years or so and one that Student and Academic Services has adapted for our many units. Just this year, University Health Services and Intercollegiate Athletics completed their accreditation / certification reviews by national organizations. Recently, the Hunter R. Rawlings III Presidential Research Scholar Program, the Prefreshman Summer Program and the Dean of Students Office, to name but a few, went through formal program reviews. Regular reviews are necessary to ensure the quality of the programs and services we offer our students.

As we began the review process, several students, faculty and staff immediately voiced concerns that once again, program houses were under attack, that the administration did not support them, and that the houses would die if the activists did not take action.

Nothing could be further from the truth. This review is not a thinly veiled attempt to withdraw support from program houses. As I said this spring when questioned at the funeral for program houses and have repeated since, program houses are a vital component of our residential offerings. Both President Skorton and I have been vocal in many settings about our support for them as an option for those students who find them of interest. From the time the Residential Initiative was launched in the fall 1997, I have worked hard to incorporate the program houses into our planning as we built the program for new students on North Campus and created the West Campus House System. Nonetheless, I also believe it is time for them to have a full review.

Our nine existing program houses came into being as a result of varied forces, from faculty task forces to student activism to staff initiatives. The first one, Risley Residential College for the Creative and Performing Arts, was conceived in 1970, while the most recent one, the Latino Living Center, emerged in 1994. Aside from responding to some external challenges regarding alleged segregation (against which Cornell prevailed), we have not systematically reviewed their successes, their challenges, the opportunities or the threats. Now is the time.

Why now? We have just completed a major transformation of our residential program, a process that began with the creation of the freshman experience on North Campus and that is culminating with the opening of Flora Rose House on West Campus this fall. We also are about to add 100 more students to each new class, placing increased demand on our housing system and exacerbating an already tight system for providing the guarantee of housing for freshmen, sophomores and transfers. With all of this change in the external environment surrounding our program houses, it is opportune to ask how they are doing.

Cornell has had a housing philosophy for the past 25 years that has accorded students tremendous choice. That choice begins with the decision to live on campus or not. It continues with the choice to live in a single gender residence hall or not; to choose to be part of a residential house system with faculty leadership or not; to select a residence hall with a theme or not; to live in a residence hall, a cooperative or a fraternity or sorority. All of these options have made our residential program one of the most varied in the nation and have provided a richness, I believe, to the opportunities students have for their residential experience.

Program houses play an important role in that element of choice. For some students, they provide a community that feels familiar and comfortable, in the same way that fraternities and sororities do for the students who choose them. Each option serves as an anchor they need to take on the rest of Cornell.

For other students, the houses provide a completely different and new experience, enriching their education and their lives in ways they never thought possible.

For some students, the program houses allow them to immerse themselves in an environment that celebrates a part of themselves (either talent or interest or heritage) that they have not had the opportunity to explore in any depth through their academic program.

And for other students, they are viewed as small, tight-knit communities that provide a home.

How successful the houses are in accomplishing these goals; how successful they are in contributing to the richness of the residential experience not only for those who are residents of the houses but also for the rest of the residential program community on campus; how successful they are in forging ties with appropriate academic communities — these are just a few of the key questions we seek to answer through a well conceived, participatory review process.

We should not be afraid of the hard questions; that is what happens at an academic institution … especially one that is, by its nature, a research institution. There is much to celebrate about our program houses. This review can highlight those successes and allow us to honestly address the areas that need attention.