“As the days to move-in tick down, the University is still changing its plans to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Snell-Hitchcock will be used as isolation housing for the 2020-21 school year, according to an email sent to returning Snell-Hitchcock residents Monday afternoon. Students previously assigned to Snell-Hitchcock may choose between moving to Fama House in the new Woodlawn Residential Commons or being released from their on-campus housing contracts.”
I question the wisdom of a quarantine housing option in the middle of the campus. Why don’t they put it in the old Breckinridge Hall that is much further away from the busy campus walking traffic?
@85bears46 you’d think they sat in a conference room and said “let’s kick that hornets nest and see what happens.” If there is any dorm with a stronger identity, I don’t know what it would be. “Here you can go from the dorm with the most atmosphere to the one with no history.” Maybe the communication had their reasoning included in it, but from what I read on the Facebook page, it wasn’t related to the group. Just angst.
@BrianBoiler I read somewhere that there are only 28 Snitchcock 2nd year left. All the 3rd and 4th year have moved off campus already. So this is why the University decides to fold the remaining 28 into Fama House.
The question is if (and that is a big if course) by next August everything is back to normal, would the Administration try to re-constitute the original Snitchcock houses again?
^ This. It has everything to do with only 28 returning students. I wouldn’t read more into the situation than that.
As for having The Plague House right in the middle of campus, maybe they should also include someone with a wheelbarrow walking through the quad and crying “bring out your dead!” The medieval architecture adds appropriate atmosphere.
IMO the concerns about house culture are legit, although I predict that it’ll just go back to being what it was once students are assigned there in upcoming years.
But this is a big over the top:
'Catherine Rohret, ’23, said that they were “heartbroken…but even more than that, angry.”
“It’s baffling to me that the university had to wait this long to inform residents that we’re being relocated. My friends and I are currently in the process of looking for apartments, and it feels almost malicious for the university to inform us of this decision on August 31, when the typical move-in for apartments is at the beginning of the month.” ’
Does Ms. Rohret understand what went on at Duke, NU, or Princeton, by any chance? This was likely no last minute decision but had everything to do with watching both Covid case rates elsewhere AND what was happening with UC housing as kids changed their minds and switched out of dorms. It’s not like they are being forced off campus. She is actually OPTING for off-campus housing. That is her choice.
BTW, there was no housing contract to get out of until just a couple of days ago, after the Snitch communication. Kids have been opting in and out of dorm housing all summer, particularly first years. That’s why they haven’t finalized anything till Sept.
Another thing that’s interesting: not sure how many beds were available in Snitch under the new de-densified plan. I’m guessing about 80-83 since about 2/3 of Snitch’s 100-bed capacity was single rooms anyway. Anyway, whatever the number, apparently they didn’t fill up the dorms even given the new de-densified capacity. I wonder how many other rooms are available? Housing will take a big hit, but the lower numbers means less density which hopefully leads to less infection and higher likelihood of keeping the in-person component up and running this fall.
If there are only 28 people, a little personal communication may have been in order. Maybe there was, but you’d think smart people could have seen this mess coming.
But of course nerdy smart people are often socially awkward. “This makes logical sense, make it so.”
I could be misremembering but thought that the housing intent form suggested that you could end up over at WRC. The goal was to place you in the house you resided in as of last winter quarter or possibly the sibling house in WRC. My son chose on-campus housing because it was still the best option for him, but he knew based on the information provided that nothing was set in stone. Because the College wanted to offer as much flexibility as possible, they didn’t bind people who secured housing in July (or even those who selected their room). Housing contracts and financial commitments were only just solidified last week. So there was a bit - perhaps quite a bit - of “fluidity” as people changed their minds or their plans or circumstances changed. Perhaps there were 50 planning to return to Snitch but 22 changed their minds in August.
Also, if any of those 28 returning students happened to be third or fourth years, then they had been originally waitlisted for housing anyway. Housing was prioritized for first years and then second years. Third and fourth years took what was left over. That was well known at the time all this stuff was announced.
Angst is a natural feeling but we are, after all, in a pandemic with many moving parts. Things aren’t always going to work out exactly the way we wish them to. After watching many other schools disinvite some in favor of others, I still think UChicago’s plan is the best one.
The good news for us is that Colorado was never on the list, although not related to this there is a decent amount of snow collecting outside right now. Much more to my liking then the smoke and temps in the 90’s.
^ True. As my husband pointed out recently, the rest of IL needs to be on that list! Unfortunately, that means a reversion to Phase III for some of the state. Fortunately, Chicago’s overall stats are still stable. and the two zip codes for Hyde Park - 60637 and 60615 - are on the better side of the distribution. https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/sites/covid-19/home/covid-dashboard.html
NU backtracked due in part to trends in suburban Cook county. But also, NU undergraduates were partying in Evanston throughout the summer, according to reports from a recent town hall meeting, and that really ticked off the residents.
Update: IN seems to have avoided the list this week.
Rubenstein Forum is more or less done. But given the pandemic it is not likely to host any major events for fall quarter. But I can see that it will start to host a lot of great conferences in 2021. It is easily in terms of architecture the most distinguished structure built on campus in the last 5 to 10 years.
But the news release here was pre-pandemic. Obviously, the whole travel industry is wrecked in the last six months.
Still I can attest that construction has been going nonstop throughout the summer months. The building itself should be ready by 2021. Yet whether the public health condition that permits it to have enough guests to stay economically viable remains a mystery.
Much more to my liking then the smoke and temps in the 90’s.