The ad hoc enrollment sub-committee made numerous recommendations last week to try to stave off the housing crunches that have become commonplace in the Fall term.
The committee's recommendations, made to the Enrollment Committee, include moving popular courses from fall to winter and increasing the number of off-campus programs.
Overcrowding has plagued the last two Fall terms. This year, about 3,900 students were on campus, and currently 69 percent of the Class of 1997 is scheduled to be on next fall.
The Enrollment Committee, made up of top-level administrators and chaired by Acting President James Wright, will release its final decision concerning the crisis today.
The ad hoc committee attributed three main contributing factors to the Fall-term housing crunch, according to Jim Brennan '96, a member of the committee.
First, the increasing number of students who are majoring in the sciences has caused Fall-term enrollment to soar because many of the science classes required for the majors are sequential from fall to winter.
This causes both inflexibility in enrollment patterns and the inability to participate in off-campus programs, he said.
Brennan said the committee made some recommendations to try to convince departmental chairs to move some courses to a winter and spring sequence.
A second problem the committee identified has to do with the popularity of fraternity and sorority rush, Brennan said.
Prior to 1990, rush took place during the Spring term of Freshman year. But because the College felt spring rush was a disruption to the first-year experience, rush was moved to sophomore spring. In 1992, rush was moved to sophomore fall.
Assistant Dean of the Faculty and Enrollment Committee member Sheila Culbert said enrollment numbers were much steadier when rush was not in the fall. But she said she does not expect a chance any time soon.
"Any change made in rush will take place as a result of dialogue between the Office of Residential Life and the Coed Fraternity Sorority Council," Culbert said.
Finally, Brennan said the ad hoc committee felt that the lack of interest in off-campus programs in the past few years has fueled the housing crunch.
According to Brennan, the committee recommended that more popular off-campus programs be offered during the Fall term and that some very popular majors, such as psychology, offer programs.
According to Culbert it is not clear whether the lack of interest in fall off-campus programs is a cause of enrollment problems or "the result of the fact that more students want to be on campus during the fall," Culbert said.
Brennan added that the ad hoc committee made mention in its formal report of the general societal reasons that students prefer the Fall term such as Homecoming and the weather. The committee was not able to offer any solutions to these problems.
Although Brennan said the students on the ad hoc committee recommended the creation of another dormitory, the suggestion was not included as a formal solution in the proposal given to the Enrollment Committee, but was included as an appendix.
"The ad hoc committee was dealing with short-term solutions. There is already a proposal by the Dean of the College to build more housing," Culbert said.
Dean of the College Lee Pelton pointed out that building new housing may not be the best solution to the College's enrollment problems.
"To build dorms is very expensive, about $50,000 per bed. You want to make sure those beds are filled year round. The enrollment problem has been exclusive to Fall term. If students continue to maintain their current enrollment plans the beds would be full in the fall and empty in the winter and spring," Pelton said.
According to Culbert, there will be no immediate radical changes.
"The Enrollment Committee has looked at the ad hoc committee's report and there is a feeling that things are well under control for next fall," Culbert said.
In the midst of all these changes the question of student choice comes into concern -- and Culbert said students will have to sacrifice some D-plan flexibility.
"Obviously, everybody would love to keep as much D-plan flexibility as possible but as much as in the past is questionable," Culbert said.
Culbert said the only difficulty students might face is in changing their fall D-plans. "Those sophomores who wish to change their D-plans from off-campus to residence in fall term 1995 will have a difficult time doing so," she said.
