The Campus Today

Outwardly, Dartmouth's picturesque campus looks much the same as it did 25 years ago. But don't be fooled! There is the much-talked about Hop- kins Center (which even now is getting its own addition, the Hood Museum). Two other buildings around the Green College and Crosby have new wings, and today's students tend to refer to the whole buildings by the names of their new wings Collis and Blunt. Away from the center of campus are other relatively new buildings that amount to bridges or wings to older buildings the new Rockefeller Hall addition to Silsby, the Fairchild Center tucked between Steele and Wilder, the Murdough Center bridging Tuck and Thayer.

But the really striking changes are the ones that alumni would tend to miss on typical three or four-day visits to the Hanover plain. That's the revolution in the way the buildings are used.

Today's Dartmouth is far more logically arranged than the Dartmouth that most of us experienced. Instead of similar departments being scattered over much of the face of the campus, they are being grouped together.

For instance, the Fairchild Center is the centerpiece of a grouping of the College's physical sciences programs. Faculty members in physics, chemistry, geography, and earth sciences (nee geology) have their offices in Fairchild, or in adjacent Wilder or Steele, and most of their classes are conducted in the complex.

The Nelson A. Rockefeller Center for the Social Sciences incorporates Silsby as well as Rockefeller Hall and now houses most social sciences departments again, both for offices and classrooms. Most of the other departments are just a few steps away such as Anthropology in Carpenter and Psychology in Gerry.

The biological sciences are taught on the Medical School campus (which means that students have to walk at a fast pace to get to classes on time from anywhere but the nearest academic buildings). That leaves most of Dartmouth Row and the other southeastern campus buildings for the humanities (though history is still in Reed).

McNutt has just been renovated for the second time in 25 years (see the December '83 issue of the Magazine) to reflect its latest function as the admissions and financial aid center. There aren't any classes there anymore, and some administrative functions have also moved out.

Of course, most of us who have gotten back for even a little while are aware of the transformation of Crosby into Blunt, the alumni headquarters. But despite the deliberate policy of showing off the newest classrooms and auditoriums to alumni during reunions, class and club officers weekends, and meetings of the Alumni Council, the whole picture will never come together unless you take the time to go inside most of the older academic buildings as well as the new ones to see what's there now and what has moved.

Even a number of faculty members haven't thought about the new logic of the place, and are surprised when I describe it. I think you'll be pleased. R.C.