<p>There have always been tensions between in and OOS students that had NOTHING to do with dorms. Different cultures, religions, incomes/class standing, politics right down the line. The only thing that has changed is that theynow have a names attached. AND as I said–it is no different at any other big state U wiht large numbers of OOS students. Most move beyond the surface differences and mix and some don’t. UW just has more newspapers and writers to comment on it. I know it is the same at many other schools with large OOS populations and dorms have nothing to do with it. It’s just a convenient easy answer. The real answers are more complex and more fundamental. At the Ivy schools one big divide is Preppies versus public school grads. People made movies about it. I believe everyone lives in dorms at most Ivy schools.</p>
<p>Nova, I don’t typically get involved with your conversations, but I think it would be worth noting that ownership and management of private residence halls have overturned numerous times in the last decade. </p>
<p>Additionally, as a student in my final year, I feel obliged to inform you that in Madison, as in anywhere else, there is a tendency of those possibly more affluent, oos students to flock together. Just because the most common option has been Towers/Statesider through the years, doesn’t mean that without those two buildings, other options wouldn’t develop.</p>
<p>I also think it’s imperative to inform you that your information on private residence halls is outdated, as there is now at least one or two private residence halls that are less expensive that UW Housing. I’d imagine they’re fulfilling a need on the part of many families during this difficult economic time to lower housing costs will still providing an authentic and supportive first-year experience.</p>
<p>This “class war” you speak of isn’t really an accurate picture of what it feels like to be on campus, though… I’d be open to further dialogue to help clarify the true atmosphere, at least from my perspective and what I’ve observed during my time here. I truly do not feel this is the appropriate thread, however.</p>
<p>Barrons,</p>
<p>Surely you mean that in your OPINION the tension has nothing to do with the dorms. After all, didn’t I just post a link to a column written by a current student who disagrees with you? In case you missed it, I’ll post it again:</p>
<p>[The</a> Badger Herald: Opinion: Blame buildings for coastie image](<a href=“http://badgerherald.com/oped/2009/10/19/blame_buildings_for_.php]The”>http://badgerherald.com/oped/2009/10/19/blame_buildings_for_.php)</p>
<p>To save you the trouble, here’s the salient quote:</p>
<p>“I’m not faulting anyone who chooses to live in the private dorms — though I question why they came to Wisconsin in the first place. Although I’m glad I didn’t, I’m fine with those who choose that path. But unfortunately for everyone, it’s created things that need not exist at a university as highly touted as UW: tension, stereotypes and hostility based mostly on ignorance and a lack of interaction and communication.”</p>
<p>(Note to MNBadger: your post appeared while I was typing this response. As you’ll see, it’s a pretty recent opinion penned by a 2009 senior.)</p>
<p>And common at other schools as mentioned by others. Even at platinum plated UVA! Note how the single voice of criticism is roundly shouted down by partisans or told this isn’t the proper venue for such a sensitive subject. Yikes.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-virginia/997453-why-uva-seen-party-school.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-virginia/997453-why-uva-seen-party-school.html</a></p>
<p>Again, Nova, as an educated adult yourself, hopefully you understand that “opinion” pieces are written and express the opinion of one writer. I opted to not take the time to critique him point by point then, and I surely will not now a year later. This isn’t a major issue on campus and it was much more likely that this columnist needed fodder for a weekly piece and didn’t have one. (If you’d like a list of the opinion columns over the past few years that were a “stretch for material,” it may be fun for me to put together)</p>
<p>Some opinion pieces this year have been real gems as well, let me tell ya! Derek Zetlin is a sports writer who attempted to transition to the op/ed section. It was also written in October and, with all due respect to the editorial board at Badger Herald, a drastic transition is experienced during the first half of the first semester each year, and quality of articles and especially opinion pieces are abysmal. The only piece of the op/ed section with journalistic merit is usually the editorial board column. Another thing you learn by being here, and actually experiencing the campus, which you have not. The columns are a grab bag of some informed, but many not, opinions scattered across campus.</p>
<p>Here’s another article suggesting that it is an issue:</p>
<p>[Coasties</a> and controversy: Madison slur raises questions - The Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle](<a href=“http://www.jewishchronicle.org/article.php?article_id=11902]Coasties”>http://www.jewishchronicle.org/article.php?article_id=11902)</p>
<p>And when you type “coastie sconnie” in google you get a whopping 1,190 results. Unscientific, to be sure, but still enough to suggest that we really are talking about an actual issue of concern to many people. I’m also sure that many of the opinions “scattered across campus,” as you say, are not informed. But, again, that doesn’t mean it’s not an issue. </p>
<p>As for Stooge’s post, I’m sorry, but I don’t get the comparison.</p>
<p>nova- come spend a month on the UW campus instead of relying on your internet news searches. Do the interviews in a scientific-variable controlled manner and see what you come up with. Identify the tensions you so often report. Find significant numbers of dissatisfied students yourself and back up your claims. Your references lack validity in the scale of things. See if it is an anthill or a mountain of a problem. What percent of students from the east coast find that to be detrimental to their UW life… And- since it is such a great problem in your eyes, why do so many continue to come to UW? There must be an awful lot of good things to offset the bad.</p>
<p>I notice you have no comment on how a “cohesive campus” could be obtained or even if it is desireable at UW. </p>
<p>It is easy to waste time searching the web to disparage a school. Your consistently negative posts and relentless harping on issues with old sources demean you, not UW.</p>
<p>You are creating an endless loop on some issues. By constantly harping on some you create great numbers of references which inflates their importance- often mentioned must mean significant, right? All sorts of faulty logic that perpetuates misleading stereotypes. You keep missing operative words- frequency of topic mention does not equal significance of any problem, if it exists. Some, most, etc matter. Context. </p>
<p>Hopefully readers of this thread will note the posts of many and make conclusions more in line with reality. How did new dorms morph into your favorite topic (again)? Everyone else- you can see why we have many reasons to be proud of UW. Again, an extremely small number of students bother with this site.</p>
<p>It’s truly amazing to me that this keeps coming up. My son is a sophmore and yes, lived in Statesider last year, and yes, is from the west coast. As for housing choices, each family makes their own decisions and for different reasons. I can say that his close circle of friends come from both coasts, the midwest and many from Wisconsin. I’m not there, but I frankly think this is more the norm and not particularly an anomaly.</p>
<p>From yesterday’s Daily Cardinal. Clearly this isn’t a big issue, but talked about a lot. </p>
<p>As a student there were other issues/conflicts on campus that helped educate students; part of being on an (at times) politically charged campus. Also two daily newspapers, with different political visions (the only U in the country with such a set up) cranks things up a notch. </p>
<p>People still talk about Professor Ely being accused of siding with labor unions in the 1890’s! We have the “sifting and winnowing” quote from the Board of Regent’s defense of the Prof., to remind us. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.dailycardinal.com/news/religion-on-campus-being-jewish-at-uw-madison-1.1640459[/url]”>http://www.dailycardinal.com/news/religion-on-campus-being-jewish-at-uw-madison-1.1640459</a></p>
<p>Wis75-</p>
<p>In an earlier discussion I invited you to offer something “by way of data to support your views” rather than “opinions based on anecdotes.” Your response:</p>
<p>“I do not intend to publish in peer reviewed journals. Like it or leave it. A discussion/chat room.”</p>
<p>I’m entitled to the same deference. This isn’t medical school, and we’re not talking about scientific experiments. We’re talking about subjective opinions. There’s no denying that “class warfare” at UW has been the subject of articles appearing for years in the national press, opinion pieces every year in UW student publications, and a frequent topic of discussion among UW students, parents, and applicants. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire. </p>
<p>As for whether UW could or should become a more “cohesive” and less divisive university along these lines, I say yes and yes. Requiring all freshmen to live on campus (once there’s enough room) might be a good start. It’s certainly worked at many other large universities and there’s no good reason why it wouldn’t work here (and by good reason I don’t mean because of the platitude that UW is too “diverse” – it’s no more diverse than many other large universities that require its students to live on campus). </p>
<p>The most puzzling thing to me about this whole issue is that every time it’s brought up UW boosters say it’s not an issue. But it’s being brought up ON CAMPUS and BY STUDENTS. Doesn’t this by definition make it an issue?</p>
<p>As for whether UW should be more cohesive, if by cohesive we mean less divided along economic and geographical lines, then I fail to see how that’s not a good thing.</p>
<p>Please Nova, don’t compare yourself to the students. You’re a bomb thrower, whereas the students investigate and write thoughtul pieces about campus life. Sure, you believe “if there’s smoke there’s fire” but frequently, when there is no smoke there can be fire and no one talks about it. IMO that’s worse. How open to discussions of issues of class, race, econ or geo issues are other u’s? </p>
<p>Kids/Alumni love the UW because the campus is so cohesive. How many people have to say that? Be honest - you could care less about the well being of students at UW, but for feeding your own twisted agenda.</p>
<p>Which of you will have the common decency to end your incessant feuding and let those of us who want this forum to be a welcoming, useful place for discussion enjoy the occasional thread that you don’t pollute with your mutual obsession?</p>
<p>If you did the level of research on other schools that you have done on UW you would find similar issues between rich and poor students, in and out of staters, preppies versus publics and so on. YOU just have not done that research so you conclude that it is the only place with some class or other divides. Now do you really think that is possible or likely? Texas Austin has private dorms as do a number of other schools around the US as there are large companies in just that business. I seriously doubt one year in a public dorm will change some aspects of human nature that include hanging out with people more like yourself. </p>
<p><a href=“https://www.rreef.com/cps/rde/xbcr/ai_en/So_55_Prospects_for_Student_Housing_Investment.pdf[/url]”>https://www.rreef.com/cps/rde/xbcr/ai_en/So_55_Prospects_for_Student_Housing_Investment.pdf</a></p>
<p>[Student</a> Housing |University Housing | Property Management](<a href=“http://www.assetcampushousing.com/]Student”>http://www.assetcampushousing.com/)</p>
<p>Whoa, I never said it’s the only place with this kind of problem. But it’s the only place that matters on THIS board, because this is the UW board. Suggesting that nothing be done about a problem because other places might have the same problem is not the answer.</p>
<p>I don’t see how Stooge and Milwdad’s comments above, both of which are directed at the messenger(s) and not the message, add anything. The views I have expressed are 100 percent on par with the actual, recent student piece that I posted earlier. So does that mean his isn’t a “thoughtful piece about campus life” or that mine isn’t? </p>
<p>I just think it’s odd that every time I, or anyone else for that matter, posts anything negative about UW we get jumped all over. I’m trying to be respectful here, and I’m not personally insulting anyone. Why can’t you show me the same courtesy?</p>
<p>In short, why can’t barrons’ announcement that UW expects to have enough housing for all freshman by 2012 precipitate a reasoned discussion on the pros and cons of the current system of public versus private housing and whether requiring all frehman to live on campus might be a good fix (or, if there isn’t a fix needed, whether it still might be a good idea)? Why does it have to degenerate into posters getting all indignant and offering no comments other than that other posters should get off the board? I don’t get it.</p>
<p>In fact, I’ll re-direct the discussion right now: assuming that UW will have enough housing for all freshman in 2012why wouldn’t it be a good idea to require all freshman to live on campus? In the final anaylsis, is the current system of public and private dorms a net plus or net minus? </p>
<p>Discuss.</p>
<p>Why can’t both of you mature past your early teens and give the rest of us a break?</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s a good idea to require all freshmen to live on campus. Hundreds of incoming freshmen are from Madison and some may be unable to afford the cost of living on campus and will live at home instead.</p>
<p>(I’ve reported MilwDad’s latest post to the moderator, as it clearly violates CC rules.)</p>
<p>Madison85, you make a good point on the issue of local students. What percentage of the incoming class at UW is from the Madison area? I assume it’s pretty high considering Madison is the second largest city in the state and has many high achieving students. </p>
<p>What about requiring all freshman students who aren’t living at home to live on campus?</p>
<p>I have relatives who attend University of Minnesota-Twin Cities: this university has ways to address new students who are commuters so that they feel included and oriented to the campus. It’d be nice if UW-Madison had a similar program though I have no data on how many students live at home. </p>
<p>Locally, I feel that there is a lot of pressure from middle-upper income high school classmates, their parents and other adults that it is truly necessary and extremely important to live in the dorm freshman year in order to obtain benefits such as the access to developing lifelong friendships. Sometimes, this is just not affordable. I don’t think it is a good idea to go $7k further into debt for a family without the means to comfortably afford on campus living.</p>
<p>Answer your own questions. What is sacred about sharing a dorm room financed by Res Halls instead of a private concern? I think living in the public dorms is a good idea, and welcome the additional space. However, the ability to choose alternative housing has been a part of the campus atmosphere for many decades. Restricting freshmen students, who have been considered adults for less time, to an on campus lifestyle is contrary to the culture. Cohesion is best obtained with a uniform population, something not desired at UW. It isn’t high school where children are necessarily confined for their own good (and there, too, exist many different ways- such as open and closed campus for lunch).</p>
<p>The ability for whites to eat at separate lunch counters was also a “part of the atmosphere” in the south for decades, and efforts to change it was viewed by many as “contrary to the culture,” but that doesn’t mean the change was wrong, does it?</p>
<p>I’m not suggesting the current UW system is akin to separate lunch counters. What I am suggesting is that the argument that things shouldn’t change – or that change shouldn’t even be considered – simply because things have always been a certain way isn’t a compelling argument, especially if the “culture” of which you speak is one that encourages division. And, as I said before, many diverse colleges also require students to live on campus while still managing to maintain diversity – often at much higher levels than at UW, which as we have discussed before isn’t exactly considered a “diverse” university.</p>
<p>Madison85, how about requiring on campus housing AND increasing financial aid? Now wouldn’t that be a marvelous idea?</p>