University of Virginia Library

Parietal Hours

The first-year dormitories have never
exactly been the most pleasant place for an
entering student to live. In the cramped space
of the sterile chamber the young and
oftentimes baffled student is met by an army
of cockroaches and a squadron of flies who
are undaunted by even the severest months of
winter.

Last year when the dormitories were
opened to women visitors on a tentative basis
at least a ray of hope pierced the otherwise
gloomy interiors. Just the thought of having
some young lady grace second floor Echols or
first floor Balz with her presence was enough
to convince the dateless first-year man that
the world at Virginia is not all that bad.

For most first-year men, even those who
belong to a fraternity, the dormitories are
home. That is where first-year men study,
sleep, and generally live. This year the parietal
hours were finally extended on a regular basis
to weekends in the first-year dormitories.

The struggle to get "girls in the dorms"
reached almost confrontation tactics before
the Administration begrudgingly granted the
"privilege" to the first-year men. Every time
before an important decision like this is made
and approved by everyone in the bureaucratic
chain of the Administration there is
always a Herculean struggle of rhetoric that
almost bursts into open violation of the
existing rules by the students.

Last year in tentatively opening the
dormitories to women on weekends the
Administration narrowly averted a mass
demonstration of first-year men who were
planning to illegally bring all of their dates
into the dormitory sanctuary. Only by
continual cajoling, convincing, and compromising
did the Administration find it possible
to open the dorms on weekends.

Although there have been a few complaints
from the morally concerned, almost everyone
involved with the first-year dormitory program
has praised the first-year men for their
responsibility in handling the new rule. There
have been only a few incidents which resulted
in any investigation or action at all.

With the advent of undergraduate coeducation
next fall we feel that parietal hours
should be extended to the first-year men all
week twenty-four hours a day. The Executive
Committee of Counselors, which is composed
of the Senior Counselor from each first-year
dormitory, voted overwhelmingly a week ago
to call upon the Administration to open the
dormitories totally to women, "as soon as
possible."

The Committee felt that to not do so
would fly in the face of next year's
circumstances. With coed dormitories it is
certainly unrealistic to think that the men and
women will stay apart. If the present weekend
rules remain in affect, they will force
counselors to spend more time playing
policemen in trying to enforce an almost
unenforceable rule than actually getting to
know and help their first-year counselors.

Administrative officials have argued this
year even with the limited parietal hours that
there is grave danger of cohabitation in the
dormitories. Right now cohabitation is not
allowed in the dormitories while "all night
visitation" is. The difference between the two
is, at best, vague.

We feel that since all of the first-year men
have male roommates extended cohabitation
is not very likely. We also believe that the
University should not try to regulate the
morals of the students. The first-year men
themselves should be the ones to decide what
they will do with their lives on a moral basis,
and the University certainly should not be
held responsible by anyone for their possible
mistakes.

Another argument against opening the
dormitories on weekdays that is used is that
the presence of women in the dormitories
would be a disruptive element in the study
lives of the students. Wild parties and huge
orgies are conjured up by the opponents of
open dormitories.

We think that the experience of other
schools that have become coeducational
refute this line of reasoning. It is found that
the men and women often like to study
together and just to generally socialize like
first-year now do in the dormitories. By
separating the two sexes many of the purposes
of coeducation are lost.

Artificial rules prevent the students, both
men and women, from really getting to know,
understand, and learn from each other. False
images grow out of this separation as the
students can only guess what each other is
really like.

We believe that the Administration should
take steps immediately to study this ramification
of coeducation. The arrival of women on
the Grounds in the fall is certainly a
momentous event. The University should act
now on this parietal question rather than
being forced later, after much bad feeling and
suspicion, to bend under pressure.