What’s all the ruckus about coed dorms?

The president of Catholic University was in the news today announcing that the school would begin to phase out coed dorms and resort to the “old fashioned” way of living: single sex dormitories. The school has decided to take these measures as a means to battling “binge drinking and casual hook-ups.”

Hmm, this reminds me of that moment when I was younger and my mom said “don’t touch the stove” and of course, if you tell a toddler not to do something, they’re instantly on a mission to do the complete opposite — just to see what will happen.

But back to the topic at hand: segregating the guys from the girls won’t necessarily stop the casual hook-ups and binge drinking. That’s partially what college is all about! (Well that and your education of course!)

So it won’t matter if you have to go across the hall or across the campus; students are going to continue to drink & hook up as they please.

But I digress. I suppose there are a few pros and cons to having coed dorms.

Pros:
- gender neutral dorms promote a more LGBT-friendly campus.
- couples have the option of co-habitating
- coed dorms promote a more communal feel to campus living (uh, not sure of anyone’s noticed but the single sex homes aren’t doing too well in the real estate market. That was a joke by the way.)

Cons:

- More hooking up (yeah right)
- Binge drinking (um, have you ever been to a frat party? Those guys can drink until they can’t feel their toes: no girls necessary!)
- Safety: perhaps school admins are fearful of “domestic” violence issues increasing with guys & girls living together
- Enforcement: having single sex dorms would obviously require extra security/ or RAs. Some one would need to monitor the dorms at all times to make sure that people aren’t sneaking in.

So here’s my biggest issue: You can’t request to live in a single sex neighborhood, or to work with only girls or only guys when looking for a job, so why make dorms that way?

If colleges are supposed to prepare us for the “real world,” why are some of these institutions so against the norms of the real world? If you ask me, transitioning from coed dorms to single sex dorms is backwards, and anti-progressive. What do you think?

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This week, under the category of “news that made me say WTF!” was this little story about students at Georgetown University taping their mouths and chaining themselves to a statue in front of the school in protest of the fact the Georgetown doesn’t provide or help to provide contraceptive options like condoms to it’s students. The school, a private Catholic university stands by the religious policies of the Catholic church under which it was founded and refuses to provide any contraception that prevents the creation of life. Let the debate begin!

OK, let’s go ahead and get this out before the NYC-liberal-arts-student part of me literally explodes – SERIOUSLY! Are you freakin’ kidding me?! Georgetown, a major university, which does not require it’s students to follow Catholic doctrine, is still, in this day and age, refusing to hand out condoms!? Are you gonna provide daycare, Georgetown?

Ah, I feel better now.

But honestly, there are a lot of good reasons why Georgetown should step up and help with the sexual health of it’s students. To begin with, Georgetown is located in Washington D.C. where officials have declared a citywide HIV/AIDS epidemic. That means that, completely outside of the pregnancy prevention argument, Georgetown is refusing to help it’s students protect themselves from devastating, life-changing illness. And yes, students at GU could just go around the corner to the drugstore and buy their own condoms, but as many many schools have found out, it’s a lot harder to get students to do that (when you’re this close to getting it on in your dorm, that CVS might as well be China). Read More »