By Jeanine Poggi and Geoffrey Sorensen
The Netherlands complex will transform into a social center for first-year students next year, forcing upperclassmen currently residing in the dorms to be thrown into the room selection pool at the end of the semester.
A two-year plan to make the Netherlands a “living, learning community” has worried some students who planned to homestead their room for the Fall 2006 semester.
Liam Hruska, a sophomore music education major who lives in Netherlands South is not pleased that he will not be able to reside there next year.
“I think it’s rather disappointing because I like the proximity [to the Student Center and classrooms] and I like being able to come back and relax in between classes,” he said.
Hruska prefers dorming in a suite and says his options for next year are Nassau and Suffolk Halls and Colonial Square, both of which are farther from the Student Center.
Michael Callahan, a sophomore Spanish education major who also lives in Netherlands South, said the change should have been announced earlier.
“My biggest problem is that they didn’t tell us beforehand,” he said. “They left us with the false pretenses that we could homestead for next year. That’s the reason I chose to live here.”
Approximately 1,300 freshmen live on campus this year and University officials expect the number to remain the same for the incoming class of 2010, Crance said.
“These changes will not create less housing for upperclassmen,” she said.
Reallocating freshmen to one central location will allow the University to create programs geared toward the transition from high school to college.
There are also proposals to redesign the Netherland’s common building, which currently houses classrooms and a cafeteria, to create a meeting place for both commuter and resident freshmen.
“We want to create a sense of connectivity between the classes with a focus on the freshmen social community,” Warren Frisina, chair of the recently formed task force to create the freshmen commons, said.
Frisina, who was previously co-dean of Honors College and has been working with the first year task force to expand freshman seminars, said they are working to change the schedule of the dining hall in the Netherlands and renovate the central building to make use of the space for a lounge and an Internet café.
While plans for such renovations have not been finalized, Frisina said the first step is making the whole complex dedicated to first-year students.
“It will give first-year students an informal place to meet where there will be other students their year,” he said.
Heather Bezarro, a sophomore English major, lived in the all-freshman Netherlands North last year and sees the benefits to living with other freshmen.
“Because we were all new students we all had to adjust to our new surroundings and I think it was helpful to know that all the people around you were basically going through the same experiences,” she said. “Living with all freshmen, if you had a question or were unsure of something, you could be reasonably confident that most of the people around you were probably wondering the same thing.”
Residential Assistants in the five houses of Netherlands South began informing students of the changes in mandatory hall meetings last week.
Residential Life will be relaying information through the room selection packets received in March.
Small fliers were also slipped under the doors in some Netherlands South suites, urging students who are concerned with housing for next year to call the Office of Residential Life.