A new residence hall community at Eastern is getting rave reviews from some students and raising objections from others.The new Creative and Fine Arts Living Learning Community is one of two new living learning communities on campus this semester.
Case Hall is home to the Community, which is aimed at students with an interest in art, music or acting. Case previously housed the "Connextions" Living Learning Community for freshman.
Living learning communities typically consist of a residence hall or residence hall floor that is reserved for people who share similar interests. The Creative and Fine Arts Community is unique because the university is also renovating six rooms in Case to provide students with communal artistic practice space, said Nickole Hale, Eastern's Associate Director of Housing.
Hale said when renovations are complete, Case will feature two sound-proofed music practice rooms, two ventilated art rooms for painting, a dance studio with bars and mirrors and a theatre room where students can practice their acting. The basement of Case will become a lounge area designed to mimic a coffee house, with a small stage and a kitchen area with coffee house equipment, said Tagan Citty, Case Hall's residence hall coordinator.
Renovations are expected to be complete by the end of the semester, but for now Community residents are living in Case without access to most communal rooms.
Flooring for the dance room has not arrived as scheduled, and renovation on the basement lounge area has not begun, Citty said.
One music practice room is nearing completion; Facilities Services workers installed carpet there on Oct.14.
"Everyone keeps asking, 'when are things gonna be done?'" Citty said. "They're really excited about it."
Freshman music education major and Case resident Dillan Smallwood said he thinks the Case Community complements his major nicely.
"I get my schoolwork done, but I still meet people who have the same interests I do," the Alexandria native said. "It's been nothing but fun."
But some Case residents aren't as enthusiastic about the new Community.
Senior Frederick Guilfoil said he was essentially forced to move into Case after another Living Learning Community was created on his former floor in Combs Hall.
The new Community in Combs was only for sophomores, so Guilfoil said he was required to move to another room. The only residence hall with available and attractive rooms was Case, he said.
Hale said housing attempts to keep moves like Guilfoil's as pleasant as possible, but in the end someone has to move.
"Sometimes we just draw it out of a hat," she said. "We know it's a little bit of an inconvenience. We do all we can to move the fewest number of residents."
Guilfoil said he doesn't have a problem with the Community in Case, but doesn't agree with a policy requiring residents to attend Fine and Creative Arts Living Learning Community programs.
Case Hall residents are required to attend at least three Community programs during the first six weeks of the semester, three more during the second six weeks, and one more during the final four weeks, Hale said.
The Community programs, which are organized by the Case Hall RAs, have ranged from designing tote bags, to eating popsicles and playing badminton, to learning to dance, Citty said.
Guilfoil said he has chosen not to attend any programs, mainly because he is too busy.
"It's not that the programs are bad. It's that I'd rather focus on school," he said.
Hale said all Case residents must sign a contract agreeing to participate before they receive a room in the Fine and Creative Arts Community.
But Guilfoil said housing was not up-front enough about the mandatory attendance. "No one reads the contract when they sign it," he said. "I wish they would've told me."
Guilfoil is not the only student complaining.
Senior Jarron Gore said he was forced to move out of Combs Hall like Guilfoil. Gore said housing offered him a room in either Case or Keene, and he chose Case.
"I didn't realize what [the Community] was, and they didn't tell us," Gore said. "I would like to stay in Case." But Gore and Guilfoil, along with several other students, will probably have to move to another residence hall next semester because they do not attend any Community programs, Guilfoil said.
Gore said he and four other Case residents went to housing to complain about the mandatory attendance policy about a month ago.
Gore, a fire, arson and explosives major from West Virginia, said Housing didn't really provide an answer, and told the five students nothing could be done because the time for room changes had passed.
Case resident and junior Randy Burns is also planning on moving out of Case at the end of the semester, though his reasons might be different. Burns is a fine arts major from Laurel, and said he got a room in Case because he thought the art rooms would cut down on late nights doing homework in the Campbell building. But because the communal rooms in Case have yet to be finished, Burns said his plan hasn't worked out.
"It's a big disappointment not having a place to work," he said. "This is my first semester living here-more than likely my last."
Hale said the students who have complaints about the Community are a very small group compared with the total number of Case residents who enjoy it. Housing has room elsewhere for students who don't want to be in a living learning community, she said.
"Living learning communities only work if the students actually want to be there," she said.
Many students said they do want to be in the Case Community.
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