B ri d ges
Duncan
C o l l ege
Named for: Charles Duncan, former member and chairman of the Rice Board (1975–77, 1981–96), and his wife, Anne, both Rice benefactors Announced: 2007. Construction projected to be completed in late 2008 or early 2009. First master: TBN Famous for: The first building at Rice — and among the first in Houston — to be built to the gold level of the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards.
H ans z en
C o l l ege
Named for: Harry Clay Hanszen, member and chairman of the Rice Board of Governors (1946–50) Built/established: 1916/1957 (One of the five original colleges; built as West Hall.) First master: William H. Masterson (history) Traditions: Originally housed men. Coed conversion: 1973. Along with Baker, the first of the colleges to go coed. Crane Day is an annual event commemorating the morning a construction team nearly dropped a crane on the dorm, forcing the evacuation of more than 100 residents. Hanszen hosts a yearly Mardi Gras party, in which students compete in a dance contest for a cash prize. Known as the “family college.” Famous for: Its original building, now called the Old Section, is considered by many to be the most beautiful of Rice’s original three dormitories. The first college to develop a college crest. Hanszen students created the “Corner for the Dreaming Monkey” coffeehouse in the attic of Hanszen’s Old Section in 1967. Named for a statue of a daydreaming monkey that resided there, it served students until Willy’s Pub opened in 1975. Hanszen students founded the predecessor of KTRU in 1967 using the wiring of a defunct buzzer system connected to all the rooms as an antenna. The next year, they were given space in Rice Memorial Center, and KOWL went on the air using antennas attached to Jones and Brown Colleges.
30
Rice Sallyport
“The residential colleges provide a unique bridge between living and learning for Rice University undergraduates,” said Robin Forman, dean of undergraduates. “For half a century, the colleges have successfully fostered and reinforced, in unique and lasting ways, the same values that Rice hopes to instill in students through teaching and research — independence, integrity, initiative, collaboration and creativity — as well as those values that we prize most in our neighbors and fellow citizens — self-governance, tolerance, loyalty, volunteerism and consideration for others.” Rice’s residential college system originally was envisioned by the university’s founding president, Edgar Odell Lovett, who was impressed by a similar system developed by his mentor, Princeton University President Woodrow Wilson. Unlike the English residential college system that was Wilson’s model, the American system did not have any fundamental educational responsibility. Instead, it offered informal learning opportunities, intellectual stimulation, fellowship, social and athletic activities and democratic self-government. Wilson’s system remained unrealized at Princeton until after Rice adopted its own system, but several other examples did exist, notably the systems at Harvard, Yale and the California Institute of Technology. Rather than choosing simply to emulate a system used by one of those institutions, the committee that had been formed to develop the Rice system adapted appropriate elements from among them, creating a unique blend of features. The formula worked, and today, Rice’s college system stands not only as the most persistent and distinguishing feature of the Rice undergraduate experience, but also as the most widely admired and copied college system in the United States. The three oldest dormitories on campus — East, South and West Halls — were renamed Baker College, Will Rice College and Hanszen College, respectively, and newly built Wiess Hall became Wiess College. Although Baker is the oldest named college, the college system at Rice officially began on March 27, 1957, when the members of Will Rice College moved into their rooms and ate their first meal together. Later that year, the first campus housing for women, Jones College, was constructed, becoming the first residence hall built under the college system. The introduction of the college system brought about a political revolution on campus. “Until 1957 student affairs had been handled by the class organizations,” Fredericka Meiners wrote in her book, “A History of Rice University: The Institute Years, 1907–1963,” “but the classes clearly had little place in the colleges. When the ‘Campanile’ announced in February 1958, during the first full year of the system, that students’ pictures would appear with their colleges instead of their classes, protest resulted in a referendum in which the college arrangement won by a slim margin.” The conflict continued when the newly created Inter-College Council came into conflict with the already existing Student Council. “After a fierce campaign,” Meiners wrote, “students passed a new constitution for the Student Association that created a Student Senate composed mostly of college officers.” Since then, student self-government has been a powerful component of the Rice undergraduate experience. By placing responsibility for initiating activities, developing traditions and enforcing discipline on the students themselves, the college system encourages a sense of social and personal responsibility. Each college has its own court to handle minor infractions, and the University Court, which evolved from the InterCollege Court, is the judicial system of student peers that enforces the Code of Student Conduct and the Honor System.
Ke y
to
S uccess
The real key to the success of Rice’s residential college system, however, may be that it truly is a home away from home. A college isn’t a dorm filled with strangers — it’s a large extended family. At the top is the college master or, more often, masters. The position is filled by a faculty member or married faculty members who reside in a house adjacent to the college. In the beginning, the responsibilities of a master were vague. “When President [William V.] Houston asked William H. Masterson to become [the first] master of Hanszen,” Meiners wrote, “the professor asked what a master did. ‘I don’t really know,’ Houston replied, ‘whatever you find useful.’” If the masters are, in a sense, the parents of a college’s extended family, its associates are like its aunts and uncles. Resident associates, who live in the colleges, most often are faculty, and nonresident associates are drawn from faculty and even staff. Associates of both types lend further stability and share their valuable knowledge and life experiences with students. Associates generally serve only for a few years, but professor of political science Gilbert Cuthbertson, affectionately known as “Doc C,” has set a record that few, if any, will break: He’s been a resident associate of Will Rice College for more than 40 years.