Some students living in Ball State University residence halls will have more than their addresses in common Fall Semester. Incoming students will be clustered together in residence halls based on majors with the intent to improve the learning environment.
Students majoring in communications fields at Ball State have been clustered together for the past five years, and Johnson Complex has operated in a similar arrangement with Honors College students for more than 20 years. Although this concept is not new, the university will add cluster housing for business and pre-nursing majors for fall semester.
"The majors chosen for cluster housing are based on fairly large numbers that are critical mass to fill a building," Alan Hargrave, director of Housing and Residence Life, said. "The majors chosen were also based on department faculty's interest in using the program."
Several majors require students to be enrolled in the university for at least a year before they are accepted into the professional program. Cluster housing is a way to offer support, as well as a way for students to determine if the major they have chosen is right for them, Hargrave said.
Senior Melissa Warren, originally a photojournalism major, lived in communications cluster housing in LaFollette Complex during her first two years at Ball State.
"It helped having people going through the same process I was of entering college and a new major," Warren said. "While I really enjoyed photojournalism, I was not sure it was something I could make a career at. The more I heard those people [in the dorms] talking about PR, the more interested I became in it."
Warren changed her major to public relations after moving out of the dorms her sophomore year. The people she met there helped to shape and prepare her for her future.
"Since I had many of those same students in class, we would often study together or rally for each other during difficult classes, such as J102," Warren said.
Devon V'soske also lived in cluster housing her first two years at the university.
"I thought the cluster housing was very beneficial to my professional development." V'soske said. "I was able to realize through the experiences of others that journalism was not what I wanted and therefore changed my major. I actually switched to fashion merchandising after my stay in the dorms."
Hargrave said he hoped cluster housing would create more interaction between students. The program will also open opportunity for department faculty to intermingle with students outside of the classroom.
There are further plans for the program, Hargrave said.
Not all majors are large enough to be part of the cluster housing program. Smaller numbers could be grouped together based on other common qualities, Hargrave said.
"The cluster housing program is intended to create a living environment to enhance academic experiences," he said. "Some majors are too small to fill a floor let a lone an entire dorm. In the future, we are looking to group students not only by major, but interests as well."
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