As undergraduates get ready for the upcoming housing lottery, several administrators and students are working to implement changes to residential life on the Hill.
On Sunday evening, Director of the Office of Residential Life and Learning Yolanda King addressed the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate about converting Hill Hall to an all-freshman dormitory and reserving Miller Hall for sophomores.
In addition to changing the make-up of Hill and Miller, several senators are working to ensure that a tiered lottery system will be in place next spring. This system would separate each class into "high," "medium," and "low" brackets. A computer system would keep track of each student's numbers and tier so that no student could by chance receive extremely low or extremely high numbers all three years.
This system would be most useful for juniors, who have the fewest options for on-campus housing. Juniors who had already received a number in the high bracket would know that they should look for off-campus housing.
"If someone gets a bad lottery number all three years, it often leaves a bad taste in their mouth when they leave [Tufts]," junior senator Jos?© Vazquez said. As a result, Vazquez said he thinks these students would be "less likely to contribute back to the University."
Vazquez, who worked on the project last semester, reported that there is still work that needs to be done to implement the tiered system.
"We're talking to the right people, getting support from the right people, and we are definitely making more progress," he said.
King is one of the administrators working with the Senate to complete this project. She said she is meeting with the TCU Senators to examine how viable the three-tiered system would be, based on the original proposal they submitted.
The Senate is now waiting for the technological aspects of the project to be worked out. For example, Web Center, which announces the lottery numbers, would need to also include a database for every student that would record a history of their lottery numbers.
"We're waiting for the go ahead from SIS online, and once we know it's possible, we're going to take the ball and run with it," Vazquez said.
Meanwhile, senators and administrators are working out the logistics of converting Hill Hall to an all-freshman dorm. Since freshmen at Tufts are not given single rooms, the current singles in Hill would house extra residential assistants (RAs) and academic tutors.
Excess singles may become study lounges, or, in the case of two adjacent single rooms, a wall could be knocked down to create one double room, assuming the costs are not prohibitive.
Miller Hall will in all likelihood become an exclusively sophomore dorm next year, as King does not anticipate that any rising juniors and seniors will bid for double rooms there. The single rooms in Miller are designated for RAs.
The Senate is also looking into future improvements with regard to residential life. At the housing lottery on March 17 and 18, senators will hand out a survey to gauge student support for a universal JumboFob. If enough students endorse the proposal, ResLife will look further into creating a universal JumboFob for Fall 2005.
