The Residential Council unanimously approved a constitution for the new Program House Council in a meeting Tuesday afternoon. The program houses concerned, which include Art House, Buxton International House, Games House and St. Anthony Hall, agreed to the constitution after revision.
The council, the result of new program house guidelines imposed by ResCouncil last semester, will increase communication between program houses and ResLife, according to ResCouncil member Jimmy Kaplowitz '06.
ResCouncil, a student advisory board to the Office of Residential Life, began work on the constitution at the beginning of this semester. It took three drafts to create a constitution acceptable to all parties concerned - the 10 non-Greek program houses, ResCouncil and ResLife.
ResCouncil enacted new program house guidelines requiring all houses to join some sort of a council last semester, said Kaplowitz, who authored the constitution. ResLife approved these guidelines over the summer. On-campus fraternities and sororities, with the exception of St. Anthony Hall, already belong to the Greek Council.
An earlier draft of the program house constitution required program houses to pay dues to ResLife. After a few houses objected to the dues, ResCouncil revised the constitution.
"The main reason it's happening is to increase communication between ResLife and the program houses," Kap-lowitz said. He cited scheduling program house events and educating the general public about program houses as other reasons for the creation of the council.
"Some of the houses are neutral, but a lot of them think it's a good idea," he said.
The main difference be-tween the Program House Council and the Greek Council is that there is "no disciplinary or regulatory aspect" to the Program House Council, Kap-lowitz said. "This council is much more lightweight."
"A lot of the constitution was based on the Greek Council's constitution - I just made the necessary changes to reflect the differences in the councils," Kaplowitz said.
After some discussion concerning the purpose of the Council, members came to an agreement about the final draft of the constitution. ResCouncil Chair Brendan Hargreaves '06 took a vote and the motion passed unanimously.
As for the future of the Council, "we're going to try to seek some status from (the Undergraduate Council of Students), but that hasn't happened yet, and (it) totally depends on what the houses want to do," Kaplowitz said.
ResCouncil also discussed improving the community adviser program and UCS's proposed changes to the first-year housing questionnaire.
"A lot of students don't even know that they have community advisers," Har-greaves said. Members suggested recommending to ResLife that advisers introduce themselves and show advisees where to come with questions or concerns.
Many ResCouncil members disagreed with a UCS proposal to base the first-year housing questionnaire on personality similarities in addition to similar habits, citing valuable life experiences gained from living with a different-minded person for a year.
