The Cornell University Board of Trustees unanimously approved 1996-97 statutory college tuition rates and a new residential housing policy at its meeting May 25.

The trustees approved tuition rates for the statutory colleges, which receive most of their funding from New York state, despite the fact that the state budget is almost two months overdue. The tentative rates include a $250 per year increase contemplated in the governor's executive budget recommendations for the State University of New York, of which the statutory colleges are part.

Cornell's trustees approved the following tuition rates with the stipulation that they will be reconsidered as necessary depending on the state's final higher education allocation:

• Undergraduate resident, $9,050, an increase of 6.6 percent.
• Undergraduate non-resident, $17,670, up 7.4 percent.
• Graduate non-veterinary, $10,660, up 6.6 percent.
• Doctor of veterinary medicine resident, $13,800, up 5.5 percent.
• Doctor of veterinary medicine non-resident, $18,600, up 5.6 percent.
• Graduate veterinary, $11,350, up 6.6 percent.
• Graduate reduced, $8,000, up 14.3 percent.

The trustees also approved an overall residential housing goal, designed to unite undergraduates' residential and academic lives, and seven basic principles the administration believes will help to achieve that goal. These will guide the university's residential communities policy in the coming years. The full text of the document, "Cornell University Residential Communities Policy Statement," is included with this news release.

President Hunter Rawlings' vision for Cornell's residential community is set forth in the goal approved by the trustees, and which garnered extensive support on campus: "Cornell University will provide supportive residential communities that contribute to an intellectually engaged and socially responsible campus environment."

Further, Rawlings has said, his aim is to create a residential policy for Cornell that "seeks to provide its undergraduates with a broad exposure to the university and particularly to the intellectual life of the campus . . . that will be seen as a model for linking the academic and non-academic lives of students into a cohesive whole."

Rawlings did not ask the trustees to take any action, or review any recommendations, on the issue of Cornell's 10 program houses. As a result of recent discussions on campus between members of the administration and concerned students and faculty, any action on the matter of program houses in general, and on the option for freshmen to live in program houses, has been delayed until students return to the campus in the fall.

At that time the administration will begin a full campuswide dialogue, involving students, faculty and staff, on the subject. That discussion is expected to proceed over the next several years, with students, faculty and staff included on committees involved in planning and implementing the new residential communities.

Residential communities policy statement

Hunter R. Rawlings III

May 2, 1996

This statement sets forth the broad policy to guide Cornell's residential communities. Specific plans to bring these principles to reality will be developed over the next five to seven years through consultation and involvement of the campus community.

Cornell University seeks to provide a broad range of activities to its undergraduate students to support its central mission of educating students in the broadest sense. The university aspires to create an environment where the lives of students inside and outside the classroom form a cohesive experience, with each part positively reinforcing the other. The residential experience, perhaps the most fundamental introduction to the university and a large and influential component of the out-of-classroom experience, establishes the foundation upon which the student builds his or her Cornell experience. As a result, residential communities have a central role in fulfilling this mission.

Goal

In recognition of the importance of the residential experience in the education of the undergraduate student, the university sets forth the following goal for its residential communities:

Cornell University will provide supportive residential communities that contribute to an intellectually engaged and socially responsible campus environment.

Cornell aspires to provide the quality and quantity of housing on campus that actively engage undergraduate students in the full life of the community. Residential communities will be designed to provide supportive intellectual, cultural, social and personal environments for students so that they may fully develop their talents while at Cornell. The communities will support the mission of educating students in the broadest sense by including opportunities to develop the qualities required for leadership, service and friendship. Through the residential experience, students will have opportunities to pursue their avocations, share creative leisure, and relax.

The residential experience will increase faculty-student interactions so that the two groups come to know one another beyond the formal interactions of the classroom, and students are drawn more fully into the life of the university. All residential communities will reinforce the values for which the university stands, including the serious pursuit of learning, appreciation of the diversity of the university community and respect for the rights and responsibilities of every individual.

Basic Principles

To achieve this goal for residential communities and to address many current issues, a number of basic principles must be affirmed. These principles will provide guidance for facility design and renovation, program development and delivery and expectations for staff and residents in the residential communities.

• Cornell will continue to provide undergraduates a broad range of housing alternatives, including cooperatives, fraternities and sororities, program houses, and both single-sex and co-educational residence halls.
• On-campus housing will be guaranteed to freshmen, sophomores, and transfer students who wish to live on campus. Upper-division students will be encouraged to remain in the full range of university-affiliated housing as long as possible.
• Residents will serve as active participants in the design and creation of programs offered through the residential communities and play an active role in the governance of those communities.
• Faculty will be actively engaged in the life of residential communities, both as faculty-in-residence and as faculty fellows.
• Residential communities will include sufficient numbers of upper-division students to serve as mentors to newer students and to help provide a sense of continuity for the community.
• Residential communities will be small enough to create a supportive environment and appealing enough to attract more upper-division students than currently live on campus.
• The exercise of individual choice from among a wide range of housing alternatives remains an important principle in the provision of residential opportunities. Since the university has an important interest in assuring that freshmen have the widest possible exposure to the full range of intellectual, cultural and social opportunities available at Cornell, it will provide options for these students accordingly.

Conclusion

With this goal and set of principles to guide the residential experience of students, Cornell seeks to provide its undergraduates with a broad exposure to the university and particularly to the intellectual life of the campus. The university expects that students will be able to fully integrate their intellectual, cultural, personal and social development through their residential experiences, whether they live in single-sex or co-educational residences, program houses, cooperatives, fraternities or sororities. It is the university's goal that, with this policy as guidance, Cornell will be recognized for the breadth and quality of its residential programs and will be seen as a model for linking the academic and non-academic lives of students into a cohesive whole.

Following the Board of Trustees' approval of this policy, the planning process and implementation plan will be designed and will involve, as full members in that work, faculty, staff and students from across the campus, including members of the Student Assembly, Faculty Senate, and members drawn from and by the communities directly affected by the residential plan.