Keeping house

Editorial: A healthy debate

In his State of the Union address on Tuesday, President Obama reaffirmed his commitment to overhaul the current health care system in America. The day before, Dean of Student Affairs Tim Foster referenced these ongoing reforms when he sent a campus-wide email about the state of the Bowdoin Health Center. In light of Director of Health Services Sandra Hayes’ imminent departure, the school is reviewing the structure of the College’s Health Center. In his email, Foster outlined three possible plans for its future: a partnership with an outside agency to handle increasingly complex administrative work, a complete replacement of the staff with employees of a private firm, or a continuation of the College’s current system with a new director.
We welcome this review. Although the Health Center received its highest approval rating ever—76 percent—in the fall installment of the Orient’s biannual approval ratings survey, it has consistently ranked among the lowest of campus administrators and offices. Even with higher ratings this year, a vocal minority still expressed the need for improvement. One female senior wrote last spring: “Bowdoin should be ashamed of the poor quality of the services provided by the Health Center. It’s a joke.” These complaints are nothing new. A 2005 Orient editorial called for extended weekend hours,continuing a decades-long debate over the availability of health care on campus. Last year, Hayes told the Bowdoin Student Government that the opening of the Mid Coast Primary Care and Walk-in Clinic had alleviated demand for walk-in hours. While we understand that the Health Center is not a 24-hour hospital, we believe that busy students would benefit from a daily drop-in hour after classes.
The Dean’s office could have reviewed the Health Center behind closed doors and announced its findings to the community once a decision was made. We thank Foster for reaching out to the campus in his email. Amidst the confusion and anxiety that have recently characterized national health care, we feel lucky to have a low-hassle system in the serene atmosphere of the Buck Center for Health and Fitness. Under the current system, an ailing student does not have to worry about providing insurance details or other personal information for a checkup. The Health Center’s total integration into the College makes dealing with sickness simple, particularly when health concerns can interfere with a student’s campus life. While we might not immediately notice a change in the Health Center’s staffing, it would—in all likelihood—impact our lives at the College. We are glad that any changes made to the administration of the Health Center will come as the result of a thorough on-campus dialogue. While we may be exhausted by the national debate, we look forward to exploring new options at Bowdoin.

Editorial: Casting a wider web

The Curriculum and Education Policy Committee (CEP) recently proposed a revision to the College’s transfer credit policy that would allow departments to start awarding credit for online courses. The CEP’s proposal is progressive for a college that just introduced online course registration this year. Courses taken online are often viewed as antithetical to the small, interactive learning environment of a liberal arts school. Bowdoin values the close interaction between professor and student, and frequently boasts of its low student-to-faculty ratio. However, it is time to acknowledge that scholarly work can be accomplished through web-based classes.
While it is unlikely that many students will take online courses in addition to Bowdoin curricula, this allowance would enable students taking leaves of absence to earn credit while away from campus. Students on leave—medical or otherwise—often enroll in several classes, either to prove they are capable of completing academic work or to avoid falling behind in their degree progress. Not all students have access to an institution of higher learning while away; online courses provide an alternative.
The proposal would give departments the authority to determine whether an online course meets the high standards of the College, and we are confident that online courses would be held to the same scrutiny as any others. That is why the CEP proposal would neither threaten the College’s commitment to classroom learning, nor diminish the quality of a Bowdoin education. What it would do is provide further academic options to Bowdoin students—particularly those who need them the most. We encourage faculty to vote in favor of this proposal.

Editorial

This piece represents the opinion of The Bowdoin Orient editorial board.

February 7, 2014

As first years scrambled to figure out their sophomore year housing plans last week, the Office of Residential Life (ResLife) announced a major change to the College House system. In an effort to entice rising juniors and seniors to apply, ResLife will now allow larger blocks if they include rising upperclassmen.

Walking into a College House filled with sophomores can be intimidating for first years. The residents might only be one year older, but they boast a year of collegiate experience and familiarity with the norms of campus social life. Over time, that divide can be easily bridged, but the wider gap between first year affiliates and upperclassmen residents has—in past years—proven too vast. As first years, members of the Class of 2015 who were affiliated with the senior-heavy 2011-2012 Helmreich House remember feeling unwelcome and uncomfortable at House events. ResLife maintains that this House was an example of what a College House should be. Having upperclassmen residents may have been a positive experience for House members, but any benefit seems to have come at the expense of those students who we think depend most on the College House system—first years.

Approximately half of each sophomore class lives in a College House. This gives these students an opportunity to live in a house full of peers and gives the year a sense of distinction that does not exist at other colleges. Just on the cusp of becoming upperclassmen, sophomores who live in College Houses are put in leadership positions and asked to organize events for the whole community. Even for sophomores who live elsewhere, the Houses provide a fundamental space for programming and socializing. Incorporating juniors and seniors into this setting may be a valuable way to connect class years, but we feel that this compromises the quintessential sophomore and first-year experiences that currently exist.

Under the current sophomore-dominated College House system, students returning to campus their junior year become part of a decidedly different social scene, which develops at Harpswell, in off-campus housing and in Coles Tower. Alumni parties and campus-wides still provide valuable opportunities for inter-grade mingling, but the Houses primarily serve to facilitate social events for a younger crowd. We don’t think this is bad: upperclassmen no longer need these central social spaces the way underclassmen do.

Having a cohesive social scene is certainly a good idea in theory, but the reality is that the presence of juniors and seniors in the Houses threatens to deter underclassmen from an otherwise welcoming and inclusive place.

The editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Erica Berry, Nora Biette-Timmons, Garrett Casey, Ron Cervantes, Marisa McGarry, Sam Miller and Kate Witteman.

Comments are permanently closed.