The planned residential and dining complexes on North Campus are shown in red, with existing buildings in black: Four new residential buildings will make a quad with Balch and Dickson halls, and four others will be adjacent to and south of the Low Rise halls. The new dining, community and recreational facility is shown between Helen Newman Hall and the soccer fields. Cornell Planning Partnership
Cornell is moving ahead with a comprehensive plan, outlined by President Hunter Rawlings last fall, to improve the residential living and learning experience and provide freshmen with a unifying introduction to university life.
Officials recently unveiled designs for structural changes to North Campus, where all freshmen will be living under the new housing plan. They also are getting ready to release a new "vision" for academic and social programming for residences on West Campus, which in the future will house sophomores and upper-class students. And a committee of faculty, students and staff is soon to be appointed to develop a similar vision, or concept paper, for programming on North Campus.
Rawlings has made improving the living and learning environment at Cornell one of his top priorities. His residential plan is designed to provide greater connection between the academic aspect of campus life and the social and residential aspects.
"The university experience is about intellectual growth, but it's about personal growth and development as well, " Rawlings said. "It is vitally important that we link the intellectual and academic life of our students with their lives outside of the classroom. We believe this plan will ensure that our students have the resources and support they need to develop fully as students and as individuals."
The $65 million residential plan calls for construction of two new residential complexes on North Campus, each housing about 280 students. One of those residences will make a quad with Balch and Dickson halls. The other will be adjacent to and south of the Low Rise halls on Helen Newman Field. The new residences will not exceed four stories, and the playing fields will be relocated, according to John Kiefer, a project leader for the residential initiative.
The residence halls will have air conditioning, and three-quarters of the rooms will provide double occupancy, while a quarter will be singles. There will be approximately a 5-to-1 ratio of students to bathrooms. The halls will include study rooms, kitchenettes, TV/social lounges and multipurpose rooms, which can be used for scheduled program or instruction support as well as less formal programming and student use. Each complex will have faculty-in-residence and residence hall director apartments.
Two locations for expanded dining services have been the subject of much study. Construction of a new third floor on Helen Newman Hall would have captured an advantageous location and revitalized Helen Newman, said Jean Reese, the other project leader. But, she added, this option posed significant financial, structural, programmatic and scheduling challenges.
"A second site, just to the northeast of Helen Newman, offers an attractive alternative which will permit state-of-the-art design and program opportunities and will include community and recreational spaces in addition to dining," Reese said.
Based on program goals, facility-related constraints and operating inefficiencies, it is unlikely that Balch and Risley dining units will remain in operation as traditional meal plan units concurrent with the opening of the new facility, Reese said. Meetings will be scheduled this fall to fully consider how best to utilize these spaces in support of program goals.
"The residence hall and dining hall projects are presently in the schematic design phase and are scheduled to be under construction next summer," Kiefer said. "Both facilities and the associated site work will be completed for the fall semester, 2001."
Most important, Reese said, is that the layout of the new halls will be designed to facilitate interaction of students and foster a sense of community. "This is an important part of the plan, to help ease the transition to college life for freshmen," she said. "We want to help them in their initial steps to become a part of campus life and to have a unifying experience with their peers. We are thinking about the circulation, the pathways in the buildings and community lounges, to facilitate such interaction and dynamics."
Demolition of Pleasant Grove Apartments, to make way for the relocated playing fields, has been approved by the town of Ithaca and is set to begin in October. Renovations to Robert Purcell Community Center are under way, and construction of the new facilities is expected to begin in the summer or fall of 1999.
Keifer said that although all of the building construction is in the city of Ithaca, much of the site work is in the town of Ithaca. Consequently, site plan approval will be required from both municipalities.
Plans for programming initiatives for the new facilities and for renovated residences for upper-class students on West Campus are as important to the overall plan as bricks and mortar, said Susan H. Murphy, vice president for student and academic services. She said the new concept paper outlining a vision for programming in residences on West Campus will be released by early October. A similar paper will be prepared to recommend programming for North Campus residence halls. That report is expected in the spring, she said.
"We want students to benefit fully from all that Cornell has to offer: from both the rich academic and intellectual environment and from the special diversity of our community," said Murphy. "We know that we must take steps to ensure that this happens for all of our students, and we believe this initiative will make that happen."
John L. Ford, the Robert W. and Elizabeth C. Staley Dean of Students, chaired the committee of students, faculty and staff who started last spring to research programming ideas for West Campus.
Ford pointed out that two separate committees were needed to address programming because the programming needs of the two communities -- West Campus, with upper-class students, and North Campus, with freshmen -- will be quite different.
"Freshman programming will be focused primarily on transition to college and personal growth as an individual comes to the higher education environment," Ford said. "It will deal with issues of personal and academic self-confidence, diversity, intellectual passion and community service."
For upper-class students on West Campus, Ford said, the programming will have a more academic, research and career focus. "As students become stabilized in the university environment, the programming will shift from a more social content to a more academic and intellectual content," Ford said.
When West Campus housing is renovated in the next few years, it will be redesigned to accommodate the programming needs and the social needs of upper-class students as outlined in the soon-to-be-released concept paper, Reese said. For example, she envisions the possibility of seminar rooms, study rooms, perhaps classrooms, and social and recreational spaces.
"This is a unique vision for a housing plan," Reese said, "and one that's still being developed. The personal development and academic needs of students, as they unfold logically, are the twin engines driving this new residential initiative."
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