how do you feel about theme floors?
A recent PioLog article prompted me to consider a topic that pops up in conversation from time to time. How should we feel about theme floors? The institution’s viewpoint is pretty clear: L&C is for them:
Theme housing options are designed to enhance your residential experience by supporting your academic interests or lifestyle preferences. Themed communities allow students with common interests and pursuits to live together and support each other through planned activities and informal interactions. [link]
Already, we have the opportunity to apply to live in halls themed around wellness/health, a shared Exploration & Discovery course, multiculturalism, the environment, visual/performing arts, foreign languages, and outdoor pursuits. With the addition of an Interfaith community next year, we’d each be hard-pressed to find a floor that didn’t appeal to a personal identity or interest of our own.
My question, I guess, is whether this is a good thing. I honestly (non-rhetorically-honestly) don’t know whether this sort of factionalizing is achieving the intended outcome. I’ve heard that the theme floors can and do greatly enrich some students’ college experiences. I can’t argue with that, nor would I really want to if I could. That seems all well and good. I can’t help but consider, however, if others’ college experiences are being affected in some way by lacking daily community interactions with large portions of those whose interests or identity has led them to pursue living on a floor populated largely by likeminded individuals (not necessarily in specific opinion, but at least in a shared identification).
Is Lewis & Clark large enough to be able to offer so many theme floors and still maintain a diverse and enlightening communal-living experience for those of us who never chose to pursue life on a theme floor? Perhaps some of the best “college” learning happens outside the classroom–in dorms and lounges and evenings in Portland. Especially during the first and second year of school, people’s friend groups are largely comprised of hallmates. If most students’ halls are guaranteed, by the existence of theme floors, not to be comprised of those of us who are the most passionate about the various identities and interests represented by theme floor opportunity, especially things as contentious as religion and diversity, is the community better off?
Likewise, are the lives of theme-floor-living students impacted detrimentally by their lack of interaction with people who have very little in common with them, accounting, of course, for any benefit of living on a theme floor? This is not to say that theme floors are populated by people who are remarkably similar–they’re not–but reflecting on some of the great friends I’ve made at Lewis & Clark… there’s no way we would have interacted with each other if not for the serendipity of random housing assignment.
Here’s the angle I approach the issue: in college, people with similar interests *will* find each other. Artists will find artists, religious students will find religious students, environmentalists will find environmentalists. The social system on any campus is such that people can network and associate remarkably easily. From what I can tell, the only two institutions in place to force continued interaction between a random (used more in the “unconnected” definition than in the true definition) group of people at L&C are housing assignments and Exploration & Discovery (freshman-year seminar class). As housing is increasingly becoming more nuanced towards preferences people think they have, do we lose some of the academic and social richness that often comes from taking a group of unconnected people and forcing them to become friends (or at the very least amicably coexist)?
Obviously, I don’t know the answer, but I am hesitant to simply accept the notion that themed housing, especially in the abundance that L&C provides it, is beneficial to large-scale community interconnectedness. Dare I make a baseless hypothesis that the existence of things like theme floors may even contribute to the apathy many have observed of the student body here. Does it not seem to follow that if we strongly institutionally reinforce the tendency to seek interaction with people of similar interests, it’s no wonder that our community seems to be troubled by issues of non-cohesion and indifference towards occurrences outside of our specific interests?
As I said before… this is just my musing, and I’m sure someone else has probably thought of it all first… I might be totally wrong (and I don’t really know how one would even begin to find out how to test this sort of thing). I’ve also probably simplified the issue much more than it deserves. Either way… it’s something I sometimes think about. So I’ll tell the internet about it.
[Administrator]
Cary
kennner
dshack
maishaparadox
angelalc
Cary, you raise a lot of good questions about themed housing.
Approaching the theme of themed housing from another (critical) angle, what happens to those students who apply for a theme hall and, for whatever reason, don’t make the cut, and are placed in a hall about which they are less than passionate? In particular I’m thinking of the students who apply for the Visual and Performing Arts hall (VAPA) in Platt West, but due mostly to sheer numbers, end up housed in the undifferentiated Platt East. Many of those kids may be just as creative as the VAPA students, but don’t have the credibility of belonging to the official theme floor. (Also, Platt rooms really suck without the chalkboard door — it’s about the only Platt perk, and only VAPA is privileged to it.) Maybe those students will go on to have great, diversity-laden experiences in their non-themed hall, but conversely (or perhaps additionally), they may feel displaced/misplaced and/or somewhat betrayed by a system they thought would respect and accommodate their interests and identity.
I’m actually one of those students who didn’t get into a theme hall my freshman year. I had applied for the multicultural hall in Akin, but got placed in Copeland instead. While at first I was a little bummed, and suprprised, the fact was I was so ovewhelmed with all of the changes around me that by the time I arrived on campus, I had all but forgotten I even wanted to live in Akin to begin with.
Ultimately, I think my experience was all the richer because I didn’t live in a theme hall; I would eventually meet many of the students living there by sheer fact of my other interests. So, the floor mates I had were wonderfully diverse in their own right and helped shape my experience in an important way those first months. I think this speaks to many of the points you make, Cary. And for most students attending such a small school, the choice of residence halls won’t limit anyone’s experience in ways we wouldn’t likely limit ourselves anyhow.
So here’s my position.
I lived in a theme hall my first year (women only) and never lived in one after that. I really enjoyed living in my women’s only environment, though for the life of me I don’t think I could tell you now what, if anything, educational or formative I got out of it. I think I was too overwhelmed with all of the newness (like Brian) to pay much attention. That, plus my RAs clearly did not like living without boys and were very vocal about it at the time. I remember there being programming specifically aimed at bringing boys into our community rather than focusing on what we might get as a benefit of being part of a women’s collective.
I remember being confused by the VAPA requirements and not feeling, despite being a writer and a singer, that I was talented or creative enough to get to live there, so I didn’t even apply. I tried to move with the all women’s hall my second year but got confused about which Forest building I was supposed to be requesting and ended up in a coed building with coed bathrooms. I remember not wanting to live there initially and then getting used to it.
My biggest concern about certain theme halls was always the feeling that they created a kind of ghettoized experience for some students. If we, as an institution, pride ourselves on openness, multicultural exploration, and diversity, then why take all the international students and students of color and place them in a building away from the rest of us? I have similar concerns about students of faith. Some of my best conversations with other students about my own faith life came because I talked about my faith and was open about my practice as a Catholic with my hall community. As an RA I posted information about community faith resources and services and had several conversations with residents about why I had done so, if anyone actually went to services (which plenty do), and what it was like to be a person of faith on this campus. If I’d lived exclusively with other committed practicing students I doubt those same conversations would have happened. Not only do I think other students benefited from knowing about my experiences on campus as a practicing Catholic, but I also think it strengthened my faith and my journey as I converted to have those conversations with others. It made me stronger and more introspective in my process. I’d have hated to miss out on that.
There are themes that I don’t think *hurt* the community (VAPA, green floor) but I am not clear on what they offer beyond what students can already get through joining student orgs. There are themes I think really help people (substance free has aided a number of students who came to the college as recovering addicts in finding a safe and supportive place to live). And there are themes that I think might be honest to blog detrimental to the community. Those themes include multicultural students and, though I haven’t seen it in action, potentially the proposed faith themed community. I’m hopeful that something good might come from it, but I have to be honest — I really feel like it’s an opportunity for students of faith to hide from good opportunities to talk about, and grow in, their faith.
I’m glad I’m not totally crazy… I can certainly grant that Stewart is a special case, and I also do not disagree with the idea of single-sex housing. My main concern, as is yours, is the effect Akin and the new Interfaith dorms have on the community. Artists are one thing, but taking the few international students or religious students on this campus and boxing them together (especially, in Akin’s case, the most isolated residence hall on campus) just doesn’t strike me being truly beneficial for anyone.
Then again, I haven’t actually lived on a theme floor, so perhaps I’m unable to truly ascertain its value. Regardless, I think your comment articulately and personally illustrates the points I was trying to make in my post. Thanks!
I’d like to share my personal reasons why I love the idea of an interfaith community on campus and how I feel it is currently within the LC social dynamic a good thing.
-LCers of faith are frequently made uncomfortable by statements frequently made at LC that are disparaging towards people of faith or towards a specific belief system. For instance a friend of mine left after his first semester here in large part due to his faith being regularly rediculed in hallways and in the classroom.
-the interfaith community has a specific goal of coming up with campuswide interfaith programming options (as I understand it from conversations with the Chaplain Mark Duntley)
-the interfaith community is limited to students who have already spent a year on campus and as such is likely to contain students who have already been put with “random” people. Students should be able after experiencing non themed housing be allowed to decide “hey themed housing sounds like a better set up for me”
-the interfaith themeed housing will be either 4 or 8 students living in an apartment and it is likely that most of them would not share religous beliefs but would share a common interest in spreading awareness that there are actually students of faith on campus. That’s a large part of why I’m posting this anonamously, because of the discomfort most students of faith have with regards to sharing it with anyone on this campus who not only is also of faith but of the same faith. If for no other reason than to open a dialogue on campus between different religous communities I’d feel that the Interfaith Themed Housing was justified and a good idea.
This comes down to a much more basic question: is it ethical to force people out of their comfort zones, even if it be for the greater good of the community or for themselves? Sure, it may seem obvious to your average LC white, upper-middle class white male that overseas kids should be spread about–after all, WE came here to learn ‘DIVERSITY’–but traveling however many thousand miles to a strange place full of strange, oddly-colored folks who speak a different language than the one you’re used to is probably scary as fuck. This is true to a much lesser degree for the other theme dorms as well.
But I still agree with you. I would have loved to have been forced into housing with unfamiliar types of people. Oh well.
One of my questions, though, is how much more comfortable for them is it to be putting a community of people who have nothing in common (necessarily) EXCEPT being far from home? I can think of two instances in the last ten years where international/TCK students living on Akin came to literal blows over cultural misunderstandings. Can I guarantee that wouldn’t happen elsewhere on campus? No. To my knowledge has it happened elsewhere on campus (i.e. have two students got into a physical confrontation over cultural misunderstanding)? Not that I recall. Just because one student is from China, one student is from Rwanda, and one student is from Venezuela doesn’t mean they have ANYTHING in common, and it seems like white privileged ignorance to assume they do. Just to kick on a flip side…
True. Though you could say the same of any theme dorm — just because VAPA kids are all artists, doesn’t mean they have anything else in common. Not a perfect parallel, of course, but c’est la vie.
I completely agree. My freshman year I lived in VAPA because I was afraid that otherwise I wouldn’t find people that I could build strong friendships with, but I ended up making the lasting friendships by meeting people at a few campus events. I found that going to events like the Drag Auction, open mic nights, and other events that sounded interesting connected me with people who actually liked to DO the same things as I did rather than a random group of people who were somehow artsy. Now, it’s true that many many of those friends also lived in VAPA, but I didn’t meet them by being in the same building–I met them by going to similar events. I think themed housing is a nice idea, but becoming involved in campus orgs and events serves the same purpose, possibly in a better way.
Having lived in Akin I can understand your general dislike that many of the international students/TCKs are placed together, but they are many white people as well. Akin is not just for the international students and TCKs. It’s for people who are interested and passionate about other cultures. There are international students and exchange students who live outside of Akin and they still often comglomerate with those in Akin anyways because they all generally have one thing in common: they’re in a new and scary place where they don’t know the norms. The reason that I got in was that I had studied abroad in France (and my roommate had studied abroad in Germany), so we where familiar with this feeling. I know that people viewed Akin as a cliquey dorm, but we were all very close. It felt more like a family than living in a dorm, and I enjoyed that aspect. That is not to say I didn’t have friends outside of my dorm, but I made those in the years following. I made friends from different grades, in different fields and from different dorms. As a freshman, I loved Akin and I think that it was a great way to start college.
As for the religion theme: Lewis & Clark is not known for it’s acceptive nature of any religion. I knew someone who could never take a friend seriously because she was raised Christian and went to church. If religious people want a place where they can get together and not feel weary about expressing their faith, then why not let them. I feel like this would definitely improve their experience at LC.
I really wish that they would have had the language-specific dorms while I was in school, because I would have moved back on campus to be surrounded with a group of people who wanted to better their skills in one language.
In sum, I feel that the themed dorms are there and available for those who want them and for those who don’t, you don’t have to join them. I feel if themed-dorms/floors is what interests someone, than they should be made available. That’s how clubs work.
I would partly agree with you, especially when thinking about Akin. The people in Akin often feel a little clicque-y to me, and it can be hard to get to know them. But I also feel that for their sakes it’s probably incredibly helpful to live with other people who can understand not being able to go home over breaks, etc. I’m not sure if Akin is the best answer to this, but it can be more reassuring to actually live with like-minded people than just going to a club once or twice a week.
Also, I’m living in one of the language apartments right now, which is an incredibly valuable experience. (I lived in Copeland last year, and it was a good experience, but I felt like I lost a lot of opportunities because our floor simply never gelled.) I love it because really the only thing holding us together is the language and culture. So we all have different interests and philosophies apart from that, which means there’s still a lot of room for diversity. We’re just similar enough that we instantly have something to talk about and bond over. I think that’s a great balance.
And because I didn’t really know any of the people I’m currently living with before this year, I feel like I’m still getting to know different people than I would have. I probably wouldn’t have had another chance either, because I’m not majoring in foreign languages.
I really liked your article, especially since this is such a great place for a forum.