East Campus residents argued against several administrative proposals for the future of residential life at a meeting Wednesday with Duke Student Government president John Tolsma.
Residents of Brown and Epworth, two selective dorms on East Campus, as well as members of Kappa Alpha, a fraternity on East, said that selective housing helps eliminate the feeling of "hotel living" in lottery dorms and lessens the number of "stranded sophomores" who are placed in lottery dorms they did not want.
"Being able to choose your community is very important," said Trinity senior Tricia Bowers, a Brown resident. "It's something for you to stick with and that will stick by you through the years."
Others stressed that selective housing does not necessarily lead to the formation of homogenous social circles.
"It's not necessary that you be like [people you live with], but you need to have a common ground to start on," said Trinity senior Kira Marchenese, president of Brown.
Some of the proposed residential options would prevent students from living in a selective dorm until their junior year. Many students criticized this idea, saying that sophomores are an integral part of selective living groups.
"Sophomores add the most vitality to the group," said Trinity junior and KA resident Todd Speed, "because they aren't as heavily involved in outside activities."
Sophomores also interact heavily with students from other classes, particularly seniors, Bowers said.
"It's a strange phenomenon, but there's more sophomore-senior interaction than there is junior-senior or sophomore-junior interaction. I wouldn't want to lose that friendship," she said.
Others said a plan to place the entire sophomore class on West in nonselective housing would simply result in more unhappy sophomores.
"There'd be no interaction between sophomores. It'd be like taking the lottery dorms that make some people unhappy and spreading them throughout the entire class," said Trinity junior Jim Griffith, a Brown resident.
Plans to place all sophomores in lottery dorms on West were actually designed to counter the poor residential experiences many sophomores have in nonselective housing by lessening disparities within the residential system and building community, said Joe Pietrantoni, associate vice president for auxiliary services.
Students also discussed ways to improve East's image and increase its social activities, such as showing films in Baldwin Auditorium and including East in campus tours for prospective freshmen.
Some said East need not try to compete with West's keg scene.
"West is not just a conglomeration of kegs," Speed said. "There's plenty of other stuff over there that we don't have."
They also expressed concern about transplanting existing residential communities.
"If you're going to boot us out of our space, which no one else wants and which is so much a part of our living group's identity, then you not only owe us the right to stay together as a group on West, you owe us the top of the pick [of living sections on West]," Marchenese said.
Tolsma, who initiated the meeting as one of several dozen discussions to garner student opinion, said he was concerned about the debate to make East an all-freshman campus.
"When I talk to freshmen on North, they say they love being with other freshmen and would like to see that done on a larger scale. Then I talk to freshmen on East and they say they appreciate their interaction with upperclassmen," Tolsma said.
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