University of Virginia Library

Creating An Insatiable Monster

What is the future for
overcrowded classrooms at the
University? According to Eugene
Paige, the head of the Office of
Institutional Analysis, the
University will be able to support
18,000 students with the present
teaching facilities to the State
Council's standards.

A second point of controversy
over larger classes is the reaction of
the faculty. In past faculty
meetings, many members of the
College faculty have stated that
they came to Virginia to get away
from large and often overcrowded
universities. Now they feel like
Orestes being pursued by the
Furies. Furthermore, one of the
unique characteristics of the
University is that some of the most
noted members of the faculty are
willing to teach undergraduates.
With increased class size, one can
only wonder if this tradition shall
continue.

Housing Dilemma

Apart from academics, planning
also seems to be lacking in
considering the other areas of the
University that are destined to be
affected by increased enrollment.
Quality housing is one of these
problems. Upperclassmen have
already been pushed out of most of
the newer Alderman Road
Dormitories to make room for
freshmen and freshwomen and are
searching for reasonably price
off-Grounds Housing. The search
for such housing is, luckily, only a
temporary problem. Accompanying
the continued growth of the
University is continued building of
apartments. One apartment owner,
in reflecting on the matter, stated
that in a few years, the supply of
apartments will probably
oversupply the demand and prices
will fall.

The dilemma of on Grounds
Housing and the decline of an
"academic village" will continue
however. As one person whom I
admire very much put it this
summer, living off the Grounds at
the University is like attending
almost any small-town school in the
nation. Unfortunately, the building
of the new dormitories will not
help this Housing Situation.

Lambeth Proposals

The onus for inept planning
here perhaps falls both on
administrators and students. D.
Alan Williams, Vice President for
Student Affairs, has helped lead the
fight for apartment type
dormitories on Lambeth Field;
apartments that might house six
people in a two-bedroom
apartment. Mr. Williams has
supported the apartment
proposition despite a referendum
last year in which almost 70 per
cent of the students voting opposed
high rise dorms.

Students have also been to
blame, however. While supporting
propositions for residential colleges,
student representatives on
University committees have
sometimes failed to delineate their
ideas or even sometimes fully
comprehend the problems and
varied types of residential colleges.

Also involved in some aspects of
this confusion, according to various
sources, is Vincent Shea, Vice
President for Business and Finance.
According to various reports, Mr.
Shea has supported a residential
college set-up at Birdwood.
However, as far as the general
student community is concerned,
one still does not know if there will
be a separate faculty for the
residential colleges or, if not, how
the students will be transported to
the main grounds of the University.

Etceters

There are other areas of growth
that could be covered in this
column. One is parking, another is
the quality of food services, and a
third is the impact of growth on the
sense of community that is quickly
dying in Charlottesville. To go into
these matters here, however, would
by time consuming and quite
boring. We must instead seek a
solution to the problem of inept
planning for growth.

The basic solution is fairly
evident. First, we must establish
what kind of growth, if any, would
be beneficial to the University in
general and to the state through the
University's position as the
capstone of higher education in
Virginia. And then, we must plan
this growth after much thought and
consideration from all viewpoints.

This call for reasoned planning
is easier said than done, however. It
is harder to do exactly because no
one really seems to know how and
where the decisions are being made.
Indeed, the above citing of those
"responsible" for certain inept
planning was not a condemnation
of individuals but rather just a
general indication of where specific
planning has lacked wisdom. It is
impossible to lay the onus for
unwise growth itself upon anyone
either in Charlottesville or in
Richmond because no one knows
who is making the decisions.

The perfect example of this
problem is last year's Future of the
University Committee, a University
committee appointed by the
President and chaired by the
Provost, which is delegated the task
clearly indicated in its title. Yet,
despite all the plans for growth
promulgated last year, the
committee only met twice and
according to one of its members,
one of the two meetings was purely
social in nature.

This past summer I paid a visit
to the University of Wisconsin in
Madison. This sprawling
megaversity was once considered
one of the finest institutions of
higher education in the nation.
Now it is just another state
university. The cause for its demise
is fairly obvious: poorly planned
growth. It seems that unless the
University begins to plan its future
wisely, it is destined to follow in
Wisconsin's footsteps.

Therefore, the call is out. We
must plan wisely for the future. But
who can we turn to for leadership?
This week the Board of Visitors is
meeting in Charlottesville. The
question of growth will certainly be
a topic of concern. Although we do
not know how decisions are
reached at the University, we most
certainly know that the Board of
Visitors plays an important part in
the decision making process. We,
the members of the University
community must therefore make
our opinions felt in the highest of
places in all manner and forms
possible. The call is for
participation in the planning of the
growth of this university. We must
write and talk to the Visitors, to
President Shannon, to Governor
Holton, and to our elected
representatives. For if we do not
help to change the destiny of our
University no one else will.