PrincetonUniversity
 

Report of the Four-Year College Program Planning Committee
August 20, 2002

Executive Summary

The Four-Year College Program Planning Committee met from January through May 2002 to develop a program for the three four-year colleges and, by extension, the two-year colleges that will be paired with them. It followed the President’s charge to envision “a residential experience that takes fullest possible advantage of the diversity and educational opportunities at Princeton.”

The Committee was guided by two principles: that the residential colleges are central to the University’s educational mission and that the expansion of the student body is an opportunity to improve the quality of Princeton’s undergraduate education. The new system of paired two- and four-year colleges will create more interaction for first- and second-year students with upperclass students, graduate students, and faculty. It will provide both enhanced academic advising for all students and a new and robust option for upperclass residential life.

In order to accomplish these goals, the Committee proposes that all juniors and seniors remain affiliated with a residential college, either the one they entered as a freshman or one to which they have moved after sophomore year. This association would be promoted by a continuing relationship with college deans and directors of studies, a limited number of meals, participation in programs, and access to facilities. The Committee proposes that the University’s fee structure be rethought in order to facilitate the participation of nonresident juniors and seniors in the life of their original colleges. The objective would be to fold into tuition a dollar amount sufficient to cover the costs of residential college affiliation.

The Committee’s specific recommendations are briefly described below in four categories (advising and staffing, programming, housing, and dining), with the space implications listed at the end of each section.

A. Advising and Staffing

• Academic advising of freshmen and sophomores should continue to take place in the colleges. Nondepartmental academic advising of juniors and seniors should be transferred from West College deans to the dean and director of studies of the college with which each student is affiliated.
• A new position, perhaps called “director of residential life,” should be created within each of the six colleges in order to enable the dean and director of studies to discharge their increased advising responsibilities. These experienced student life professionals could provide the level of service that has become essential in the increasingly complex environment of undergraduate residential life.
• Ten graduate students resident in each of the six colleges should be given specific assignments related to academic, cultural, and residential programming. These responsibilities should require no more than ten hours per week. The current position of assistant master should be discontinued.
• The colleges should offer expanded services in writing assistance, fellowship advising, specialized advising events, and career advising.
• The current faculty position of senior fellow may be discontinued in order to transfer resources to higher-priority needs.
• New masters’ residences should be constructed for Whitman, Butler, and Wilson Colleges in the closest possible proximity to the colleges themselves.
• College office space should be planned to accommodate the proposed changes in staffing.
• The current assistant master apartments should be made available as rental housing for faculty. The residents would have fellows’ privileges in the colleges.

B. Programming

• Students should take the lead in designing programs for four-year colleges. The presence of upperclass and graduate students will help intellectual and cultural activities thrive in the colleges. Nonresident upperclass students will also be involved in college activities.
• Four-year colleges will provide a natural home for campus-wide student-initiated activities.
• Colleges might form College Societies to serve the particular interests of older students.
• As many classes as possible should be held in the colleges.
• Each college should have two large modular classrooms seating twenty-five students as well as a conference room for sixteen to eighteen students. These can be multipurpose rooms as long as the teaching function is central to their design.
• A mix of public meeting and recreational activity spaces should be spread throughout each college. These include attractive, quiet study spaces; alcoves and small lounges; a central common room adjacent to the dining room; a TV room; multipurpose meeting and practice spaces; and a café. Fitness facilities are desirable but need further study.
• Additional arts performance and rehearsal spaces, so greatly needed by the University at large, should be located within the colleges.
• Individual, locked study carrels would ideally be provided for resident upperclass students in the four-year colleges.

C. Housing

• Entering freshmen should continue to be assigned randomly to colleges and will remain in their assigned college for two years.
• Rising juniors who reside in either college in a pair should have equal preference in drawing into the four-year college. They should be expected but not required to remain there for two years.
• Preference in room draw for the four-year college should be given first to rising seniors already living in the college; second, to rising juniors already living in the college and in the paired college; third, to rising juniors in other colleges; and fourth, to rising seniors living outside the college. The maximum size for groups of rising juniors and seniors drawing together into a four-year college should be eight.
• Rooms for juniors and seniors should be spread throughout the college, but should be clustered to permit draw groups to live in the same area. Upperclass rooms should primarily be large singles and doubles (one to three rooms), with a smaller number of quads (five rooms). Bathrooms should be located within upperclass suites.
• Suites for graduate students will be dispersed throughout the college.
• The facilities of the four-year colleges must be made maximally appealing in order to attract a representative cross-section of the student population.

D. Dining

• Significant improvements are required in residential college dining. The new dining plan should feature simplicity of access, flexibility, opportunities for meal exchanges between colleges and clubs, numerous guest meal passes, and built-in points for use at the Frist Campus Center. Ideally, dining halls should be open, without required check-in.
• The quality of food needs to be improved.
• The colleges should provide extended meal hours and make snacks available late into the night.
• Freshmen and sophomores should have a contract for approximately twenty meals per week. Resident juniors and seniors should have a contract for approximately fourteen meals per week. Those who join clubs or prefer independent arrangements should receive a partial rebate.
• Nonresident juniors and seniors should be charged a fee, folded into tuition, which would cover receptions, snacks, and occasional meals in the college with which they are affiliated.
• A subgroup of the Committee plus selected other administrators should be charged to make recommendations concerning the design and implementation of the new dining plan.
• The quality of dining space should reflect high standards for furniture, lighting, acoustics, and ambiance.
• Current kitchen and servery areas must be renovated in order to bring them to the standard that will be achieved at Whitman College.

The priority placed on each of these recommendations by the Committee is described in the Priorities section of the report.