Faculty Note Housing Disparities

Faculty members are integrated into the residential life at Exeter through school-subsidized housing, whether they live in dorms or in houses. However, some instructors identified inequity and volatility in the Academy’s current housing assignment system and dissatisfactory housing facilities, particularly for single faculty members and for administrative officers, who are not offered housing.According to Dean of Faculty Ellen Wolff, instructors must live in a dorm for a minimum of 10 and a maximum 15 years before moving to a house. “For each year in the dorm beyond 10, they can live for two years in post-dorm housing,” Wolff said. As a result, faculty can only rely on school-subsidized housing for a maximum of 20 years. Afterwards, they move off campus and buy or rent housing for themselves.When faculty have finished their time in the dorm or choose to move into a house, they must apply to live in a particular residence. “Placement is decided based on a number of factors including family size, faculty preference and seniority,” Wolff said.Often times, however, new faculty members with families do not live in dorms because of limited space. “The way I understood it when I got here was that everybody had a minimum of 10 years in the dorm,” English Instructor Lundy Smith said. “The year I came, there was one person with a family who lived in a house and didn’t get into a dorm until six or seven years down the road. But she still did dorm duty and got her dorm credit.” Smith does not view the the system as unfair, however. “I came as a single person, so there was more flexibility [in where to place me]. There was a room for me right away,” he said.While such instances are inevitable, many instructors allege that dorm apartments for single faculty are of lower quality than for families. Mathematics Instructor Aviva Halani described her experience transferring from her fourth-floor apartment in Dunbar to Bancroft. “There's a lot of inequity,” Halani said. “The first apartment I had in Dunbar had a really weird layout. I wanted to move out because the living area was so small that I couldn't have my advisees over for dinner,” Halani said. “I was told that essentially I could only move out if they could find another single woman to live there.” When Halani moved out of Dunbar, it was made clear to her by the Academy that she could be asked to move if a family required her space. “When I got my housing letter it said this [arrangement] is contingent on the needs of the Academy and essentially if there was a family that needed that space, I would get kicked out,” she said.Mathematics Instructor Panama Geer also noted that single faculty members may face obstacles living in faculty housing. “I’m very sensitive to the fact that for single folks, it’s probably difficult for them to have lives outside of the dorm when they’re having to be on duty frequently. Especially if they live in an apartment where there’s not a private entrance,” Geer said. “Having a private personal life is something that can be difficult to balance with dorm life.”After faculty members have spent the required ten years in a dorm, they file a request to the Dean of Faculty to live in a house, which can lead to competition. “Some people play the game that if I do a year in the dorm, then I have a better chance of getting that house. People are doing the math, they’re seeing who’s getting out of the dorm. How long they’ve been here. What [houses] they’re looking at,” English Instructor Ralph Sneeden said. “I’m so glad I don’t have to do that anymore.” Spanish Instructor Jacqueline Flores agreed, commenting on the sometimes unexpected competition for certain houses. “For years I remember hearing that a faculty member had their eyes on a house. There was already a faculty member living [in that house] but everybody knew the [other] person wanted that house. I think that's a lot of pressure, when your house is targeted as ‘That's the place I want to move into.’ It shouldn't be like that,” Flores said.In addition to inequities for single faculty members, housing facilities themselves are often subpar. Flores recalled moving into her current house and finding the house in an unacceptable condition. "They told me [before I moved in], ‘the house will be ready in a few days because we have to clean it.’ I walked in, and the living room floor was muddy and trashy,” Flores said. “In all my 22 years of living in campus housing, each time I moved out I always left those residences spotless, because that was my responsibility.”In addition, Flores, who underwent spinal surgery two years ago, was rejected assistance by a department in Facilities Management. “[Because of my] spinal surgery two years ago, I'm afraid of falling,” she said. “There was one time that I submitted a work order because the ceiling lamp bulb needed replacement and my request got denied.”However, Director of Facilities Mark Leighton said that facilities works closely with the Dean of Faculty to make sure the assigned house can accommodate any disability—”for example, we have two houses that have lifts to accommodate access,” Leighton said.According to Leighton, each work request is evaluated to “verify who is responsible” before it is acted on. “Each faculty member moving into academy housing is provided with a document that clarifies the faculty’s responsibility and what is the responsibility of Facilities Management,” he said.Exeter does not subsidize housing after 20 years. As a result, faculty like Sneeden will have to move off campus in the upcoming year. “If you’re trying to build a residential community, most boarding schools house you for the duration of your career,” he said. “In fact, that’s one of the reasons I almost left [the Academy] a few years ago—I was trying to find a school that had that deal.”Biology Instructor Townley Chisholm also wished that he could play a greater role in residential life. “When faculty move off campus they take about a $30,000 pay cut and the school loses the after-school hours of service that they once provided,” Chisholm said. “I love living in my house off campus, but I can't be as present on campus now as I was when I lived on campus.”On the other hand, Geer pointed out that faculty, before accepting their job at Exeter, should have already been aware that Exeter only provides housing for up to 35 years. “Perhaps some schools house you for life, but the housing policy was made clear before I accepted the job,” Geer said. “I do feel like it was really clearly spelled out, so I don’t have a lot to complain about if I agreed to it.”In addition, Geer believed that working at Exeter provided faculty with a myriad of other benefits that outweighed the problem of limited subsidization. “It’s really easy for people to look at what other people have and think, ‘Oh, they’ve got it so much better.’ But [the fact that] I can put in a work order and somebody comes and fixes things, I don’t actually pay for rent right now, my kids can go to school for free, we can eat meals in the dining hall. These are big benefits,” Geer said.Exeter’s peer school, Phillips Academy Andover, is an example of a boarding school that houses faculty members for the full duration of their careers. “We feel faculty housed on campus are more of a presence in a student’s lives,” Andover Dean of Faculty Patrick Farrell said. “Thus, this policy fosters strong connections between our students and faculty, and promotes student safety.” However, this also means that faculty must perform “residential responsibilities” such as dorm duty. Sneeden acknowledged the downsides of such a system, noting that older faculty members may not want to perform residential responsibilities that become harder with age. Regardless, he wished that the school gave the option. On the other hand, many administrative positions, such as college counsellors, are not housed at all. According to Director of Human Resources Rachel Henry, administrative faculty are paid additionally when they perform residential responsibilities such as dorm duty and advising but it may not have the same financial impact as providing housing.A committee consisting of Henry, Wolff, interim CFO Marijka Beauchesne, Director of Benefits and Compensation Dirk De Roo and Assistant Principal Karen Lassey has been formed to address this problem. “We’d like to open up the conversation about administrative faculty housing,” Henry said. “We don't currently offer them housing as part of their compensation package, and we’re asking ourselves, should we be looking at what other schools are doing?”