The Boardroom in the Dorm Room: The Final Word on Gender-Neutral Housing

By JULIA CALAGIOVANNI

January 21, 2012

Gender-neutral housing has all but exhausted its potential for dining-hall debate. It exists, which is good news for the seniors who want to take advantage of it, and it doesn’t harm those who don’t wish to participate. But while student support seems to be firmly behind extending the program for the current sophomore class—making gender-neutral housing an option for their junior and senior years—Yale’s uppermost administrative body hasn’t granted permission for the policy change.

Last February, the Yale College Council’s Gender-Neutral Housing Committee requested that gender-neutral housing be made available to this year’s current juniors, but that proposal was turned down. The committee, currently headed by Joseph Yagoda, CC ’14, and Isabel Santos-Gonzalez, SM ’13, has gone to great lengths to present the case for the administration to approve gender-neutral housing for juniors. The Jan. 9 release of this year’s report certainly marks a departure from precedent; according to YCC president Brandon Levin, DC ’13, last year’s report was not made public and only presented data from those already living in gender-neutral suites.

This report, in contrast, compiled data from a November 2011 survey of the sophomore and junior classes. Roughly one third of each class responded. Statistics show that 81.9 percent of those surveyed support a gender-neutral housing option for juniors, and 67.1 percent would consider a junior-year gender-neutral suite themselves. While a certain amount of selection bias may be at play, it seems that students overwhelmingly approve of the initiative.

The YCC has been fielding questions and concerns from students and administrators throughout the process. Yes, students who do not feel comfortable sharing a bathroom with students of the other gender would be able to request a single-gender floor. No, no one will be forced into a mixed-gender suite. No, gender-neutral living arrangements will not create an environment with a higher risk of sexual assault, a question of paramount importance for many people given the negative campus events of recent years. Melanie Boyd, special advisor to the dean on gender issues, contributed a letter to the YCC’s most recent report, arguing that gender-neutral living situations would not place students at a higher risk of experiencing sexual assault.

“If anything,” she wrote, “I would expect mixed-gender rooming arrangements to work against the dynamics of assault, by giving students an additional opportunity to develop meaningful mutual relationships with people of different genders.” Maria Trumpler, director of the Office of LGBTQ Resources, echoes Boyd’s sentiments. Trumpler agrees that these living situations can create an environment of respect and maturity, and that they are particularly important to LGBTQ students wishing to live in a “queer-friendly suite.”

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Following years of student activism, collaboration with faculty and administrators, and YCC initiative, Yale became the last of the Ivies to allow a form of gender-neutral housing. According to several of the people involved in the process, the residential college system made the logistics of implementing gender-neutral housing more complicated; other colleges offer gender-neutral housing as an option akin to themed housing, but the same model could not be replicated within Yale’s housing system. When gender-neutral housing was first implemented for seniors in the class of 2011, those overseeing the change worked to ensure that the option would be available in every college. According to Trumpler, the committee felt that “that ambitious goal was worth the extra challenge.” Now that gender-neutral housing has been a reality for two school years, extending the policy to juniors is unlikely to cause any significant logistical challenges.

The final decision on the YCC’s proposal will be made by 16 alumni, known collectively as the Yale Corporation. Ten members are Alumni Fellows, elected to six-year terms by their fellow alumni; historically, only about 20 to 25 percent of alumni participate in the annual election. The remaining six are Successor Trustees, elected to up to two six-year terms by their predecessors. These 16 join the President of the University and the Governor and Lieutenant Governor of the State of Connecticut, ex officio, creating a 19-member board.

Yale claims that the Corporation, relative to equivalent bodies at other educational institutions, “plays an unusually active role in University governance.” The best known of their responsibilities is to oversee the University’s finances and endowment, a task that has created, at least in the current board, a strong showing of Fellows from the financial and consulting industries. All Fellows are alumni of the College or the graduate and professional schools; currently, they number four women and 12 men. The Corporation biography of just one Fellow, Francisco Cigarroa ’79, mentions direct experience in education: Cigarroa is currently the chancellor of the University of Texas system.

In the past few years, the Corporation has been involved with major non-financial decisions affecting student life. The return of ROTC to Yale and the plan to construct two additional residential colleges were both ultimately approved by the Corporation.

But in a recent interview with the Herald, YCC President Brandon Levin explained that gender-neutral housing is unique because the YCC usually has autonomy in making decisions on student policy initiatives. He could not recall another YCC policy that has required Yale Corporation approval during his tenure. He added that the YCC does not work with the Corporation directly, but generally with only Dean Miller and President Levin.

Even former YCC President Jeff Gordon, SY ’12, who was at the forefront of the initial passage of gender-neutral housing for seniors, told the Yale Daily News in February 2011 that “people sometimes refer to the unknown third parties who are more apprehensive about it, but I have yet to have a conversation with an administrator who personally opposes this.”

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Despite the apparent lack of opposition from administrators, the Corporation has found sufficient reason to reject the proposal. But it is unclear what exactly those reasons are. Hardly any information is available, electronically or otherwise, on the Corporation’s work; its regulations specify that, “[minutes] of the Yale Corporation and its committees are closed for 50 years.”

It seems reasonable that this particular issue would fall under the purview of the Committee on Institutional Policies. While it is possible to find a listing of the members of this committee, no further information is available on the committee’s work or priorities.

The issue of the Corporation’s transparency has been raised before, but its policies haven’t changed. In 2003, a controversial and short-lived student movement known as the Student Committee for Corporation Reform called for the Corporation to make its proceedings more transparent. The Student Committee held an open meeting to which Corporation Fellows were invited; none showed up. At the time, Corporation members stressed that they meet with students often, but that the most appropriate course of action for concerned students would be to speak with the university president. On their website, the Corporation does not publicize any open meetings or offer opportunities for students to meet with Fellows.

Some institutions do have policies similar to the “democratic” reforms the Student Committee called for. While policies for educational governing boards vary, some elect voting student members; Cornell’s Board of Trustees consists of 64 voting members, including students, faculty, and alumni. A similar board of alumni fellows at Columbia advises the Dean of the College on undergraduate policies; three students and two non-alumni faculty members serve on this board.

Referring to the ever-present question of the “campus sexual climate,” Joey Yagoda, CC ‘14 said, “Yale is in a different place now that it was two years ago in terms of the way we discuss certain issues.” While this may be true, Trumpler attributes the Corporation’s reluctance to allow juniors to live in mixed-gender housing to a lingering “concern” about how best to “treat female students equally without creating social chaos.”

There’s no doubt that the question of gender-neutral housing has certainly sparked plenty of student debate, particularly in light of the negative events of the past few years. And while most would agree that campus discussion is a productive development, the gender-neutral housing decision now lies in the hands of the Corporation. While the student opinion on this issue seems clear, it remains to be seen how the Corporation will rule.

The Yale Corporation will assemble on Feb. 24 and 25 to make a decision based on the YCC’s most recent report. The outcome might be what supporters of gender-neutral housing have been waiting for. Should the measure pass, current sophomores may opt for a gender-neutral suite when making their 2012-13 housing decisions this spring. But if the Corporation votes no, we’ll likely be having the same discussion next year.

—Contributed reporting by Charlotte McDonald

Julia Calagiovanni is a freshman in Yale College.  She is a staff writer for Broad Recognition. Charlotte McDonald contributed reporting.  This article originally appeared in the Yale Herald on January 20, 2012.