Certain changes may be coming to University of Dallas dorm life. Last week, Dr. Roper made an announcement to the residents of Theresa Hall that starting next year Theresa will hold a beta test for a new “House System” idea.
This “House System” will differ from the Franciscan University model of “households” and will more closely resemble the halls at the University of Notre Dame .
The beta test will go on for three years with the idea that 10 Sophomores will stay in Theresa next year, then 10 Juniors, and so on. The main premise of the model is to give students the option of staying in their dorms until their Junior year.
There are two main incentives to this approach for dorm life: firstly, students will not have any increases in room price, but they will be eligible for the 5-day meal plan available for Clark residents, so room and board will be far less expensive than Clark. The second incentive is that this model will greatly enhance the community between upperclassmen and underclassmen.
Dr. Roper stated, “It will give upperclassmen the opportunity to play the elder statesmen, but in a more informal way than the role of the RA, passing down their wisdom and experience to the freshmen.”
Dr. Roper and the housing team launched this model, hoping that UD could revert to its old ways before Clark when students stayed in the same dorm for three years. He remarked that he was a 3-year resident of Madonna Hall and loved having mentors and mentees throughout his time in the dorms.
The main goal of this model is to foster community amongst the students and, as Stefan Novinski stated, “You cannot have community without memory.” Thus the hope is that as the years go on and students pass through the dorms, forming ties to a specific dorm community, each dorm will develop a unique history and memory attached to it.
There are several specific ways that the model will aim to enhance dorm communities that greatly mimic the Notre Dame model. One way is the idea that each dorm will hold one big social event every year that they will host themselves.
Another way would be for each dorm to choose one charity to support and throughout the year participate in service together as a dorm.
Lastly, residents could enjoy communal meals together each weekend as a dorm, which would be especially beneficial to the residents without the weekend meal plan.
Maybe even one day all the dorms, like Clark, can have specific donors assigned to them, which would be a way of involving alumni in the community, expanding the community even more. Dr. Roper stated that since his first year as Dean, he has been aspiring to bring community to campus and this idea was born from this enduring pursuit of community.
The reason the beta test dorm is a girls’ dorm, rather than a boys’, is due partly to the size of the dorms. Since there are only two boys’ dorms, the test would be more restrictive. Since there are many more girls’ dorms, participating in the test is much more voluntary.
Dr. Roper stated that an incentive to join the test would be that if one shows strong leadership qualities in their dorm they could be more likely to be considered for an RA position.
Some backlash expected from this move is the question of Rome and whether or not you can reserve your spot in the dorm while abroad. The housing team assures these questions will be addressed throughout the testing years and acknowledges that this is just a test run to see what happens and they will be very open to student feedback.
Something like this has not been done at UD for 20 years, since the construction of Clark, so everyone is eager to see how this will change UD life.