In a desire to appeal to the various interests of upper class residential students, the Office of Residential Life is set to introduce Residential Themed Communities (RTCs) as living options for the 2013-2014 academic year.

Such communities are common in colleges and universities across the country, especially large institutions, and are gaining popularity in smaller colleges such as Iona.

Similar to living learning communities (LLCs), RTCs present an integration of academic experience and living experience, in which students of similar interests and academic disciplines live together and participate in programs and initiatives that cater to their academic and social passions.

Iona has proposed four RTCs for sophomore, junior and senior students that will be located in various residence halls on campus.

The RTCs students can choose from included communities focused on sustainability, wellness/healthy living, civic engagement/service/leadership and fine, performing and creative arts. Each of the four communities will have partnerships with various academic departments as well as partnerships with departments within the Office of Student Life.

Carllos Lassiter, director of Residential Life, explained that creating these RTCs and extending the living learning communities to upperclassmen was one of the projects he was charged with enacting upon arriving at Iona earlier in the fall, working with Elizabeth Olivieri-Lenahan, assistant provost for Student Development to bring the initiatives to fruition.

“The main ideas about approaching upper class themed housing is that we want to make sure we’re providing all of Iona’s students with a holistic, academic and co-curricular approaching to housing,” Lassiter said. “Working with staff and faculty programming wise will be a unique opportunity for upper class students. It will help build a stronger sense of community and also engage career development so that [through programming initiatives] students can be more intentional in their career planning.”

Although announced less than one week ago, some students already expressed interest in – and even envy of – the new communities.

“As a senior, I am happy for, and slightly jealous of, the underclassmen that have the opportunity to live in the themed communities,” said Christina Grafstein. The president of IC Green admits that she particularly finds the sustainability community to be quite exciting due to its focus on building sustainable practices across campus and in the local and global community through the promotion of recycling, water and energy conservation and other sustainable practices.

Yet, not every upper class student is eager to commit to an RTC, with many eager to move off campus while others are wary of the possible lack of intellectual diversity due to living with those with whom you share the same interests and beliefs.

Sophomore Hunt Patterson worries that students living in the RTCs “may not be exposed to different opinions, as they would if they were living with students who had contrasting views.”

It is likely that there are many students who, like Patterson, are uninterested in the RTCs which raises the question of the future of RTCs if there is low or even no enrollment.

“We’re flexible in how we will approach low application,” Lassiter said. “We may not have a whole floor, but we may have a floor that’s half for sustainability and half for civic engagement, for example.”

In the same vein, some RTCs may not run if there is a severe lack of enrollment and general interest.

Applications for the RTCs will be available for students on Monday, Jan. 28 at which point the location of each RTC will also be announced.