To the Editor:
As a former Yale Freshman Counselor and current Penn medical student and Sansom Advisor, I read with interest Mark Littmann's column on student housing ("A community -- for freshman," DP, 9/19/05).
One point, however, should be clarified. While most freshmen at Yale do "live together in a 'yard' for the first year," and then move into the residential colleges, they are intimately associated with the colleges from the moment they arrive.
Freshman are grouped on Old Campus by college, have college-specific Freshman Counselors and scholastic advisors, have their schedules signed by their respective college dean, and relax in their own college's cloistered courtyards. Many take most of their meals in their college's dining hall (each of Yale's 12 residential colleges have their own dining hall). At football games, they sit with upperclassmen near their respective college flag, and they help their college win the Tyng Cup, an intramural sports championship.
Perhaps most importantly, assignments within the college system are random; no particular student interest group, race, or religion is more represented in one college versus another. This arrangement breeds a certain residential college allegiance -- even for those few students who decide to live off campus during their junior or senior years.
Such a design is an impossibility given Penn's large student body, strong Greek tradition, limited on-campus space, and affordable off-campus alternatives. Having students bounce around from dorm to dorm is not a real residential college system. But Mr. Littmann is right that placing all freshman near each other breeds a terrific
atmosphere and encourages class loyalty. Rather than create a poor imitation of the residential college system, Penn should strive to develop a new model of residential life -- and Mr. Littmann's ideas seem right on track.
Jonathan Criss
The author is a 2001 Yale graduate and a second-year student in Penn's School of Medicine.
