Next year, Treat House, known as the East Asian Studies Theme (EAST) house, will discontinue its current academic-cultural focus and become the Education and Society Theme house. It has served as a hub for focus on East Asian studies since 1982.
According to Residential Education (ResEd), the new theme will connect undergraduate students with volunteer student organizations, faculty members and the School of Education.
In a statement announcing the change, ResEd cited the School of Education’s new minor degree offering as evidence of a growing interest in education among undergraduates.
“The Education House at Stanford envisions a living learning space that serves students as a hub of activity around student engagement in education,” according to ResEd.
The resident fellows in the 63-person house, education professors Christine Min Wotipka and Anthony Lising Antonio, echoed that interest in education has been on the rise, both academically and through local tutoring, counseling and test preparation.
“In all of that activity, we see an opportunity to create a living-learning space to connect these activities and students together and foster a community for deeper engagement and opportunistic connection,” the RFs wrote in a joint e-mail to The Daily.
ResEd spokespeople were not available for comment.
The change has been met with some opposition by several house alumni.
Todd Nelling ’08, who lived in EAST during his sophomore and senior years, wrote in an e-mail to The Daily that “surely there are other [non-theme] dorms in less demand…why does it need to be EAST?”
Russell Chou ’12, the residential computer consultant at EAST and the president of the anime and origami clubs at Stanford, said EAST had only three priority residents this year, which he said may have influenced the move to instate the education theme.
A letter signed by 41 EAST alumni was nostalgic, expressing hope that EAST will be remembered not only as a center for debate and discussion about East Asia, but also as a vibrant and close-knit community that drew students from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines.
“The language tables at dinners, the student-led seminars, the trips to Chinatown and Japantown, the week-long EASTfest and the other theme-related events…created a community unified by a common interest,” read the letter.
Zack Wood ’07, a former academic theme advisor in EAST, suggested a number of alternative organizations for current students interested in East Asian studies, including the Asian American Activities Center, the Center for East Asian Studies and Okada, an ethnic theme house.