Though Columbia dorms will not be going gender-neutral this year, floors two and three of Carman Hall remain entirely divided along gender lines.
This is an anomaly in Columbia housing, where most floors are coed, and first-year students who have found themselves on these floors express mixed feelings about their fate.
One of two first-year-only residence halls, Carman’s second floor is all-male, accommodating 13 doubles with 26 male students, while floor three is all-female, accommodating 19 doubles with 38 students. An RA of the same gender staffs each floor.
“I like it. I like the people in my suite,” said John O’Leary, CC ’13, adding, “Everyone’s got their own things to do. We’re not as tightly knit as other floors, but we all get along well.”
Carman’s remaining 11 floors are coed, with each floor divided into 27 single-sex doubles housing 54 first-years, as well as one single for an RA.
“It’s this cloistered, quiet space,” O’Leary said of his current residence. “I can always leave to go to other floors, but if I need to work, I have something to fall back on.”
For some students, the single-sex floor is not a social one.
“There’s little inter-floor interaction,” Nathan Grubb, SEAS ’13, said.
While some residents appreciate the reprieve that a quieter living space brings, others lament its less-than-social group dynamics.
“Not too much going on in halls and lounges. Not as much interaction as on other floors,” Jon Moed, CC ’13, said. Reflecting on what he considered a fractured dynamic, he pointed to the personalities of the people who live on the floor as a possible explanation.
“I think it’s more a demographic factor and the types of people that live here. There seems to be a lot more camaraderie on other floors,” he said.
His floormate, Michael Li, CC ’13 agreed, saying, “I definitely know the people on this floor a lot less than the people I dormed with at camp for three weeks.” Li had chosen Carman as his first housing preference and said he was surprised with the all-male floor placement.
“I’m pretty darn sure I put ‘no’ for the single-sex option,” he said.
Carman Hall is not included in the room selection process, but randomly assigned to first-year students based on their listed preferences in the first-year housing occupancy agreement. Because of this, many of the current residents of floors two and three were placed there randomly.
As an international student from Ghana, Adwoa Banful, CC ’13, opted for a single-sex floor by virtue of its familiarity. “My high school boarding experience took place in single-sex houses. I decided not to stray too far from my comfort zone because I was moving to another country,” she said.
Floormate Jennifer Lee, CC ’13, also went to an all-girls elementary school and middle school, and though she didn’t request to live on a single-sex floor, she expressed general contentment with her living situation.
“I kind of like it. I can just walk around in anything, in my pajamas, and not care,” she said.
Lee said the dynamics of her floor also felt somewhat fragmented. “I’m really close with some of the girls, but some of the girls on the end of the floor I never talk to,” she said.
Though she admits the floor was not cohesive at the beginning of the semester, Banful pointed to study breaks and floor events as initiatives that have enhanced the cohesion among the members of floor three. She and her suitemates organized a floor event two weeks ago, inviting StressBusters, a program of student-led mini massages, and a Mary Kay beauty consultant.
“We tend to gravitate to our comfort zones when we start a new area of life, but when you get people to interact, they start to integrate more,” Banful explained.
Jennifer Smerling, CC ‘13—who wanted to live on a lower floor for religious reasons—said she was happy with her choice and thought the availability of single-sex floors was important.
“In general, there needs to be housing that has that option, whether it’s for religious reasons or maybe comfort reasons—any reason, really,” she said. “For me personally, I would be fine with a coed floor, but for those that aren’t, I don’t think anyone should be thrust into that decision.”
O’Leary agreed: “It exists for the same reason people prefer gender-neutral housing,” he said. “It’s important just to have that option if students need it.“
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