Dean of the College Lee Pelton:On Life at Dartmouth

By John McWilliams, A.J. Monaco and Kevin Robbins | Wednesday, May 7, 1997

The Dartmouth Review: What are your responsabilities as Dean of the College?

Dean Lee Pelton: My responsibilities are most of the areas outside of the classroom. Dining services is not one of them, but the advising program, the class dean program, residential life, and housing are all part of my responsibilities.

Review: Speaking of housing, how successful do you think the East Wheelock experiment has been?

Pelton: From my point of view it's been successful. I think that it is misunderstood in some quarters in that I think that there are some who conceive of it as this idyllic, idealized place that would solve whatever social ills existed at Dartmouth College. That is why I object so much to the term supercluster.

My expectations were modest to the extent that it was my hope that it would provide an alternative living option for students. It would be one of many options. It would advance the notion that there is a connection between the lessons that one has inside the classroom and what we do with those lessons outside the classroom.

The other purpose of the residence was to suggest that it's possible to broaden our notion of what it means to be intellectual at Dartmouth and in the world. Sitting around on the floor and drinking a glass of Chardonnay while discussing Plato's Republic is one intellectual exercise, but intellectual exercises can take various shapes in a current variety of places. I assume, for instance, that intellectual activities occur on the study abroad programs. They occur on geological field trips, or in laboratory settings. They occur on the bus ride back to class from a lacrosse game. They occur on playing fields. I wanted to continue to encourage those kinds of conversations, and involve the faculty as much as possible in those conversations.

Review: What role do you see the Greek system playing in the near future at Dartmouth?

Pelton: I refer to it as the Greek-letter system because there are persons of Greek descent saying that it's not the Greek system — its the Greek-letter system. But the system obviously has a history and a tradition in connection with the College that is very old. It is also one part of the institution that has been under scrutiny for many years. When I arrived here six years ago, one of the first things I did was to try and read everything I could read about Dartmouth. I stumbled on a report, a study, that Ernest Martin Hopkins had commissioned on student life in 1935. Prominent in that report was a long discussion about fraternities and their value at Dartmouth. There was discussion about drinking. The big question was about whether or not the College should institute sophomore rush.

Not just the administration, but the students and faculty, have always been involved with discussion and scrutiny of the Greek system. It will probably always be the case that the students who are in the system will feel a sense of impending doom — that some dark, evil forces have been trying to dissolve the system — even in the face of there being no evidence of that.

So I think that my answer to your question is that the system is a part of Dartmouth. It's history here is complicated and complex and has evolved with the community discussion. And I suspect that discussion will continue.

Review: Do you think Dartmouth could exist as we know it without the Greek system?

Pelton: I don't know; I can't make that sort of prediction. I do know this: it is the nature of communities and institutions to change. The school that you attend is not the same as the school that my friend attended 25 years ago. Hanover is different, Dartmouth is different. It is in the nature of institutions to change.

Review: There seems to have been a recent increase in the number of fraternities being indicted for serving alcohol to minors. It also seems like more students are being arrested for drinking. Do you think the Hanover police have been more vigilant lately?

Pelton: I don't know if that is true. If it is true then I am unaware of an increase. The police figures that I am familiar with don't bear out an increase in violations. You obviously know that the College is not a refuge for individuals or groups. My experience is that in small towns like Hanover — Middlebury is another example — the law enforcement agencies have more interest in these matters at some times than others. You never know. And we don't, by the way, communicate in these matters with the Hanover police — I wouldn't want to. The College is not in the habit of protecting students or organizations from criminal prosecution.

Review: Do you have any idea why the Hanover Police would have more interest now?

Pelton: You would have to ask them. I've been here six years and when I first arrived here there were some indictments. It seems to happen every couple of years actually, and I don't know if it is a response to particular events. There is a lot of conversation in the community about high school students getting into fraternity parties. Maybe the Hanover police just have more resources than before.

Review: Recently, fraternities have been found innocent by the College, but are still being prosecuted by the State of New Hampshire. If the College found a fraternity innocent through its judiciary apparatus, and the state found it guilty, would the College come in and take further action?

Pelton: No, because we have very different evidentiary standards. There are things that are of interest to colleges and universities that are not of interest to law enforcement agencies. They would be completely separate.

Review: Do you think that drinking is a problem on the Dartmouth campus?

Pelton: Well, I have to take the long view. You've been here a couple of years; I've been here six, and I've been at three institutions in my career. The problem of alcohol is universal. I will say that some things have changed. When the drinking age changed from 18 to 21 it caused enormous problems for colleges and universities. It meant that our former rolls as educators trying to teach growing adults how to be responsible drinkers was greatly diminished because a quarter of the students are of the drinking age. In 1991, legislation was passed which essentially requires colleges and universities across the country to enforce rules and laws related to possession and consumption of alcohol. It put all colleges and universities in a very difficult position because obviously underage drinking will occur. There's no law, there's no college policy that can change that.

What we want to do is to remind students that these are what the laws are. You are responsible for obeying those laws. If you get caught, the College can't serve as your refuge. Having broken this law, you may be convicted of a crime. We want to have a policy that students can understand, that's clear, and that makes sense. We also want to have an environment that allows the students some measure of freedom to manage their own social lives. We have that here.

I had a meeting with IFC presidents and other officers. One thing I said to them is that you guys have it pretty good around here. Look at the national fraternities that have said that no alcohol can be served at all in their chapters. Look at the national movement that is now probably a decade old of kegs being banned and parties being BYOB. All of these regulations are not coming out of the colleges and universities. They are coming out of the fraternities themselves, because they're worried about the liability issues. There are places that have hired bartenders or obtained liquor licenses. These things are expensive. Here students have a tremendous amount of self-government. When I arrived, kegs had been banned on campus. Safety and Security was much more involved in monitoring parties. We then created a student monitoring system. This monitoring system allowed students some level of self-regulation.

Is there a drinking problem? Well, here is what all the data suggest. The data suggest overall that students are drinking less at Dartmouth or at least binging less. By that I mean five or six drinks in one sitting. There is less of that today than there was three years ago. The data also suggest that we now know alcohol served annually at fraternity and sorority events is less today than three or four years ago. The data suggest however that the high risk areas haven't changed much. There appears to be almost a kind of bifurcated student population. There are more students that are abstaining, but the number of students who continue to binge at high levels hasn't dropped.

Review: What do you think should be done about the bifurcated campus?

Pelton: What we need to do is to be attentive and make sure that our policies address the problem. I'm not worried much about the low-risk drinker in the low-risk environment. Those people are probably OK. What I'm concerned with is the high-risk drinkers; that is to say, those people that are prone to this terrible disease called alcoholism. There are among us people who are prone to that in an environment where alcohol is readily available. I worry about those students — it would be foolish not to. Our policy should reflect that. We should probably have some good educational programs, although I must say that some of the latest evidence suggests that education doesn't work.

Maybe part of our strategy with policy should be to put more of our resources into peers talking to peers about drinking, and less money into some of the other things.

Review: You recently reconvened the College Committee on Alcohol and Other Drugs. Do you foresee any changes in Dartmouth's alcohol policy?

Pelton: There probably will be changes. I don't know what those changes will be because the Committee has not reported back to me. That Committee is a standing committee that has been around for a long time. It fell into some misuse and what I have done is to try to revive it.

Review: What do you think of the current situation with Dartmouth Dining Services [DDS] and the student referendum?

Pelton: I don't know what the outcome will be and I say to you truthfully, I don't know what agreements were made between Lyn Hutton [Dartmouth's Vice President and Treasurer] and the students. I honestly do not know what the vice president and treasurer plans to do with the results. I will give you my impressions though. There are several things the students want at Dartmouth. They want choice, variety, flexibility, and value for their money. Those are reasonable things. Those are things that any rational person would want from a dining service.

We once had a system that required freshmen to pay a considerable amount of money, and some of the people who don't eat huge quantities of food complained. I think the DDS provides those four things that I mentioned very well. I also know that in order to have those services, there is a cost incurred beyond the cost of the food. The issue now is whether or not students are willing to give up either choice, variety, flexibility, or value.

If you go to Harvard or Yale you sign up for twenty-one meals a week and that's it. If you want to go to your local McDonalds, then you pay for that. The Harvard dining service is open 7-9 in the morning, noon to 2 in the afternoon, and 5-7 in the evening and that's it. If you want a bag of chips at 3 you have to go out into the square and get it. One of the wonderful features of our dining services is that it has provided all of those things that I just mentioned, flexibility, choice, value, and variety. Now we're at a situation where we have to make some cultural decisions: whether or not we're willing to pay for that. I think that's what the referendum represents.

Review: Harvard and Yale are located in large communities. Those places need residential dining in order to create a sense of community. Do you think that residential dining is as important in a small place like Dartmouth?

Pelton: Well, what you say about those other places is true. There are schools smaller than us that have decentralized dining that is tied to residential structures. I would say that I think there is a connection between dining and culture. Winston Churchill said culture begins at the dining table. I really believe that. Dining is more than just sitting down and gobbling food. It's more than just digesting food. It's a place to talk and socialize. I think we all recognize that importance. My own desires would be to have a program that could maximize that aspect — the cultural aspect. I think we do a pretty good job of that.

Review: Do you see Dartmouth's role as a residential college as secure?

Pelton: Yes, but frankly I think there should be more students on campus than there are.

Review: How could Dartmouth attract more students to live on campus?

Pelton: By providing students with the kind of housing that they would find attractive. Some of that is pretty obvious. Students prefer single apartments; townhouse arrangements have appeal. There are benefits to being on a campus where the computer network itself is so important. The convenience of being able to walk to a class, to converse with peers — it's something that I would very much like to see more of.

On the other hand, I recognize that for some students there will be some obvious attractions to living off campus. You are less under the domination of the College. You do not have to worry about service of alcohol, those sorts of issues. You can make your own food, which can be cheaper. But in terms of maintaining vibrancy in the student culture, I would like to see the students on campus.

Review: I spoke with Nancy Jeton, who was recently elected to serve on the Board of Trustees, and she said that the College might consider using the north campus to create new beds. Do you see this as a possibility?

Pelton: There will continue to be conversations about new beds. There are all sorts of issues related to housing and residential life that need to be attended to. Whereas overall our housing is pretty good, we have some housing that is substandard. Some spaces need to be decompressed. We have some places that are too small for two people to be living in them — that means new beds. In the fall term we are at 100 or 101% of our housing capacity. We have students who want to be on campus but who can't be. That means that they cannot enroll in the courses that they want to enroll in. That's not a good situation.

Review: Why can't a student live in a derecognized fraternity house?

Pelton: Well, there are some philosophical reasons. There is a connection between Dartmouth and its fraternities and sororities — there is a history there. There is a relationship there. The fraternities have recognized that the very source of their being is Dartmouth College. And what gives Dartmouth College the right to set alcohol policy for privately owned organizations? What gives it the right to say that we can have kegs or cannot have kegs? Well, what gives it that right is that it has always been an assumed right, so that relationship has always been there. The relationship the College has to fraternities and sororities is different than the relationship there is at, for example, Williams, where there is no relationship, where the administration doesn't have any say. Here, there has always been that special relationship.

Second, even though many of those organizations are privately owned, they're really within something that we all think of as the campus. Dartmouth is a campus. The houses are here and they have an impact on the campus, on the environment, on the students who live here, on the faculty and the staff who are part of this community.

Finally, the Greek houses are only there because of Dartmouth. Remove Dartmouth and those organizations have no purpose. Given all of that, the College does have an interest in how those organizations are organized and regulated. Philosophically, it would be really ludicrous — because you quickly encounter the history and the traditions and the connections — to say that an organization can somehow become independent, have its own rules, and regulate itself without any regard to the College whatsoever. What the college says is that cannot happen, hence there will be no such thing as independent fraternities.

Review: Two weeks ago I spoke to a '43 alumnus, and he described his experience at Dartmouth as a unifying one. If you look at the situation today, you think of affinity housing. How do you think the situation with affinity housing breaks down with regard to Dartmouth's tradition?

Pelton: Let me explain, first of all this is a different world than it was in '43. The student body was a lot different, the students bring very different interests to the school. And in some ways, in 1943 this would have been a much easier place to handle students. There were not a lot of cultural distinctions to be dealt with on campus. There were no women here. This is a very different place.

God bless that '43. He has his experiences and his Dartmouth will always be his Dartmouth. Nobody can take that away from him. This is a different place.

We have academic affinity houses. We don't have ethnic affinity houses. Those houses are open to any student whatsoever, regardless of color, race, or gender. The only people who can't live in those houses are freshmen. Those houses are tied to academic programs, they're supported by departments. I have students who come to me all the time and ask for cultural affinity houses or ethnic affinity houses. I say no, we don't have those. We're not going to have those. But I will support academic programs, because I think it is one of these lasting significant values at Dartmouth that we value the connection between what happens in our classroom and what happens outside the classroom. Any student can live within the Cutter [Shabazz House] — you don't have to be African-American. In fact, that does happen occasionally, although probably not as much as it should happen.

There are other houses, for example La Casa, with more diversity. White students and black students live there. There are Latin-American students, and there are Latino students. Probably the same thing is true at the Asian Studies house — some Chinese, probably as many white as Asian students.

We don't have deans for ethnic groups, but we do provide administrative resources to meet a variety of needs. We provide a dean for fraternities and sororities. There is no other organization on campus that has a full time dean dedicated to their needs. But we do recognize that certain students have needs.

We have provided some advisors, and we have some deans who play a part time role advising and serving groups, if those groups can demonstrate a need. But we don't have a dean for multi-cultural affairs, we don't have a dean like some places do for African-American students or a dean for Latino students. We simply don't have those.

We try as best as we can to integrate our services to students in a way such that all students will benefit, but also in a way that recognizes the special needs that certain groups have. Those groups are wide-ranging, as I said, and although there's nothing that says the College has to provide a dean for fraternities and sororities, we do.

So that's how that system works. The one exception is the director of the Native American program, which was established a long time ago when John Kemeny wanted to recommit the College to its original purpose. Once you develop such a position it is hard to change.

Review: Do you foresee the Indian symbol coming back to Dartmouth any time soon?

Pelton: No.

Dean of the College Lee Pelton:On Life at Dartmouth

Article Tools

Related Articles