Duke University has an absolutely gorgeous campus that must be seen in person to be believed. Take a walk around West Campus and you'll be overwhelmed by the majesty of its neo-Gothic architecture. At one end of the quad is the Clock Tower, which climbs high overhead and seems to separate this Gothic Wonderland from the mundane world outside; it feels protective like a barricade but it also reminds you of the seriousness and academic nature of the institution. Forming the other end of the quad, is the Duke Chapel. The focal point of the University, its towering steeple can be seen from miles away, reaching up like a hand through the forest of Carolina pine trees that blankets the campus. Each of the buildings along the quad is constructed in a similar style, but look closely and they each have their own character and nuance. Some have decorative chimneys on their roofs. Others are topped by towers. Each doorway is different. As you pass through the pointed arch that leads to an adjacent quad, you notice the gargoyle the decorates the entrance. You look around and notice that each building has such gargoyles tucked away in the architecture where they are barely noticed unless looked for. However, they aren't placed there haphazardly; you begin to notice themes. One building features 3 gargoyles which represent "See no evil, Hear no evil, Say no evil". The gymnasium features a gargoyle sporting a football helmet. The auditorium features gargoyles with the faces of comedy and tragedy. The rest of the campus is in keeping with the Gothic tradition, featuring large buildings with forboding granite edifices, externalized supporting columns, and pointed arches. One gets the feeling that the whole campus was chiseled from native stone rather than being constructed piece by piece.

It's easy to get caught up in the illusion that you're in a fairytale or at a medieval castle rather than at a college.

What an amazing place to LIVE.

Yes, the quad described above isn't just an academic quad, it's the residential quad where students live.

Duke University is one of the few places to offer four years of guaranteed on-campus housing to students. Although students are only required to live on campus for their freshman year (or is it the first two years?), most students choose to stay on campus all four years. While part of the reason for this might be the lack of suitable off-campus housing, I think the main reason for this is the beauty of the campus. I think everyone at Duke choose to go there in part because of the amazing campus. Take one look at the picturesque Gothic architecture of West Campus which is a movie producer's dream (_The Project_, and _The Handmaid's Tale_ to name a few), and it's almost mind blowing that these are the DORMS!

For the consideration of living space, Duke is divided into 1) East Campus, 2) West Campus, 3) Trent, and 4) Central Campus Apartments.

Duke is divided into two main campuses, East and West. The two campuses are separated by a mile long road serviced by a free bus system. The two campuses differ greatly in their architecture, atmosphere, and philosophy. Historically, East Campus was created first and was the original location of the women's college. West Campus was built later and was the location of the men's college before the sexes were integrated. While West Campus is often described as "masculine", East Campus has more feminine qualities. This symbolism is embodied by the Duke Chapel of West Campus with its "phallic" steeple (complete with Fr3nch t1ckler!) contrasted with the "mammary" dome of East Campus's Baldwin Auditorium (complete with nipple!).

East Campus and West Campus are both home to classrooms as well as dormitories.

EAST CAMPUS
As a freshman, you'll be required to live on East Campus, which recently (1996?) became a freshman-only campus. In contrast to West Campus's Gothic architecture, East Campus features the Georgian style of red-brick buildings. The atmosphere is wide-open, with a large grassy area that can be enjoyed for lawn sports, suntanning, congregating with friends, or studying. There are a few shade trees, but for the most part, there is little to block the sun or your view of the clear blue Carolina sky. While West Campus represents the hustle & bustle of life, East Campus is more laid back. It is also viewed as being the campus of favor for liberal arts students (A.B. degree) compared to students of science (B.S. degree) who generally favor West Campus.

East Campus is home to several academic buildings, Baldwin Auditorium, Lilly Library, its own gymnasium, the Marketplace (a dining hall), the Duke Coffee Shop which has been host to diverse musical acts, the Ark (the dance studio and also the oldest building at Duke).

Students living on East Campus are required to purchase two separate dining plans, one for eating at the Marketplace and one for all the other campus eateries.

Most of the buildings on East Campus line the quad which faces Baldwin Auditorium. These include: Alspaugh (The Spa), Aycock (The ....), Bassett, Brown, Giles, Jarvis, Pegram, and Wilson. I haven't lived in these dorms, so there isn't much I can say individually about these, but there shouldn't be many differences between them. These are all old dorms. I remember walking through the halls of these and hearing the floors creak. I don't think that any of these have air-conditioning, but they may have been renovated since I graduated ('97).
East Campus also has two old dorms which aren't on the main quad -- Southgate and Gilbert-Addoms (GA). GA is a bit down the road from the main quad, and Southgate is even farther. Students don't like to live in these dorms because they have to walk so far to get to classes or the bus stop.

There are two new dorms on East Campus that were opened for the '94-'95 school year. They are named Blackwell and Randolph. They are nice four-story dorms having air conditioning, elevators, and large commons rooms. They are split dorms, with each half being a mirror image of the other, and Blackwell is a mirror image of Randolph.

I was in Blackwell my sophomore year, the first year it was opened. That was before East Campus became a freshman-only campus. Originally Blackwell and Randolph were given the not-so-creative names of ED-1A/1B for Blackwell and ED-2A/2B for Randolph. Our dorm committees were given the honor of naming the dorms. I lived in ED-1A and we almost decided upon Waffle House, but some girl did all this research and stuff and urged us to name it Blackwell, after a racetrack which was located where East Campus is today. The people in ED-1B originally called themselves "Snoop Dormy Dorm" then named it "Ernie's Disco Barn" (for E.D.B.). Imagine the embarassment of ordering a pizza to your room and saying "I live in Snoop Dormy Dorm, room 202." For a while, Randolph was called "Icehouse" and the students painted the bench outside with the logo from Icehouse beer. Uh, yeah.

There's another dorm on East Campus, which is a "special dorm" called Epworth. Epworth has a long history and isn't really a dorm. It's a white house with a balcony and everything. When I was at DUKE, Epworth was occupied by the SHARE group, which is a selective living group (more on those later) which is sort of like a fraternity/sorority in that you bave to be voted in to live there, except that SHARE was co-ed. SHARE consisted mostly of students who were a little bit different. I'm not saying that to be mean -- any of the SHARE students would agree with that statement. They tended to be very artsy, dress different than most students at Duke, and many were homosexual. I don't think that SHARE is still in Epworth or if they even still exist. Last I heard, the administration tried making Epworth into a dorm for students who wished to take part in an experiment of a "substance-free" dorm, which means no drugs, alcohol, smoking or any other fun stuff.

When I was at Duke, the East Campus dorms were divided into female-only, male-only, and mixed-sex (separated by floor or section) dorms.

While East Campus used to be the home to fraternity sections, that is no longer true since East Campus is freshmen-only.


WEST CAMPUS
West Campus is the main part of Duke University and is what most people picture when they think of Duke. It is where most of the classes are located. It is also where the main library, the student center, most eateries, and the Duke Chapel are located.

From the social standpoint, West Campus is the hub of campus life. All of the fraternities are on West Campus, so that is where most of the parties are. It is also where the campus bar the Hideaway is.

The West Campus dormitories consist of the several dormitories in the main quad (the clocktower quad), as well as several connected quadrangles: Crowell quad, Few quad, Kilgo quad, and Craven quad. West Campus also contains the nearby Wannamaker dormitories as well as the dorms of Edens quad which is in a separate part of the campus.

The dorms of West Campus are divided into fraternity sections, selective housing, and regular dorms. Every four years or so, the locations of the different living groups gets shuffled around. That is so the living groups that are on the main quad won't gain popularity just because of their location. One year they might be right on the clocktower quad, then the next year they might be ostracized to Edens quad.

Generally, the dorm rooms on West Campus are very small. For what you gain in location, you sacrifice luxory. Nonetheless, most students want to live on West Campus because of its proximity to classes and because it's where all the parties are. Others, however, see the partying as one of the negative aspects of West Campus.

Physically, the dorms that surround a quadrangle are connected so that one can pass through one dorm into another without having to exit outside.

As on East Campus, some dorms on West are female-only, male-only, or mixed. But because West Campus has fraternities and no sororities, there seem to be more female-only living groups on West.

As far as I know, the only dorms that are air-conditioned on West are the Wannamaker dorms.


TRENT
Trent used to be a part of "North Campus" along with Hanes dormitory and Hanes Annex. After Hanes and Hanes Annex were abandoned in 1996(?), the term North Campus was lost and the area where Trent is located is just called "Trent".

I'll cut to the chase: everyone hates Trent! This is because Trent is so isolated, not being a part of West Campus or East Campus. It is only a modest 5-10 minute walk from West Campus, but for people who get "sentenced to Trent", they think they're in Alcatraz.

Trent isn't so bad. I lived in Hanes my freshman year, and Trent was considered luxury living compared to Hanes! At that time, Trent had its own cafeteria, where most of the students living on North Campus (all freshmen) ate. It even had its own sand volleyball court and its own parking lot. But when the rest of North Campus closed down, Trent all of the sudden became a dormitorium non gratum. The closing of North Campus was coincident with the formation of the all-freshman East Campus, so it was mostly sophomore men who didn't join fraternities who got sent to Trent instead of West Campus.

Trying to make Trent more desirable, the administrators decided to renovate Trent, adding carpet, adding air conditioning to all the rooms, ven constructing a gymnasium in Trent's basement. But none of this is working to improve Trent's image. It will always be the bane of sophomores and whoever else is unlikely enough to be sent there. The only good solution is to build more dorms on West Campus and to get rid of Trent.


CENTRAL CAMPUS
West Campus. East Campus. North Campus.

What's next... South Campus?

Nope. Central Campus.

Central Campus consists of several University-owned apartment buildings. One can live on Central only as a sophomore or greater, not as a freshman. The process of applying to live on Central is the same as living in any other dorm. Instead of paying monthly rent, you pay by semester just as you would in a regular dorm. You don't pay for utilities, and maintenance is taken care of by the University.

Only two students can live together in a Central Campus Apartment, and -- in case you're getting any kinky ideas -- they have to be the same sex. Options for the apartments are: single-bedroom, two-bedroom single-bath, and two-bedroom two-bath. Just as for a dorm, you enter a lottery for the central campus apartments, and depending on how lucky you are, you may or may not get the location that you desire.

I lived on Central Campus my junior and senior years and I loved it! While I understand the desire to live on main West, I think that living on Central is the best option. Dorms at Duke are small. On Central Campus, you get a huge bedroom, a full bathroom, a kitchen, and a large living area, and it actually costs less than a dorm! If you like your peace and quiet, Central is a good place to live since its far removed from Main West where all the parties are. You also get air-conditioning!

Central Campus has its own grocery store so you can stock your fridge. It also has some outdoor basketball courts. It is in close proximity to the Sarah P. Duke Gardens which are so beautiful, especially in the springtime.

Central Campus is served by a free bus system (the same one that serves East Campus), and you really HAVE to take the bus to get to class because it's about a 20-25 minute walk. If you decide to walk to campus and you're not in a hurry, you can walk through the Duke Gardens on your way.

For some reason, there is a stigma about Central Campus being the "ghetto" because mostly African-American students live there. Sadly, because of this fact, a lot of students overlook Central Campus.


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Now for some miscellaneous stuff that I haven't mentioned in other sections:

Dorm rooms overall:
The dorm rooms at Duke are small compared to what I've seen at other colleges. Duke doesn't have suites. The bathrooms are shared with other people on your floor. Most dorms don't have air-conditioning, except for the newer dorms and the apartments on Central Campus. You can request air conditioning if you have a medical necessity, e.g. asthma. For dorms that don't have central A/C, you can get a window-mounted A/C unit.

Dining:
Dorms don't have their own dining facilities, but there are several campus eateries. Dorms also provide kitchens if you wish to prepare your own meals.

Fraternities/Sororities:
Instead of having Fraternity houses like other colleges, each fraternity is allocated a "fraternity section" within the dorms. Basically it's the same as having the fraternity have its own dorm space; however, if a fraternity doesn't fill its entire section, they will have to share their space with independent students.

The Sororities at Duke don't live together. The women in sororities are scattered among the different independent dorms. Women in sororities may also live in selective dorms.

Selective Dorms:
By now, you're probably asking, what the heck is a selective dorm?
A selective dorm is a lot like a Fraternity in that you live together and pay dues and have parties; the only differences that I can think of are that 1) you're not a national organization, and 2) you probably don't have to memorize the Greek alphabet.

A lot of the selective houses at Duke are entirely social. There's the all-men House CC, the all-women Cleland, and the mixed-sex Mirecourt.

There are also speciality selective houses, such as Roundtable (a bunch of do-gooders who like to kiss professor's butts and do nice things like clean up litter on the highway and help retarded kids), the Langauge Dorm, the Arts Dorm, and SPECTRUM (a multicultural dorm).

Housing Lottery:
You decide whether you want to live in a dorm or a central campus apartment. Then you rank all the dorms or apartments on a form (I think this is done on the web now) and then some guy named Bill Burig puts all the students' names in a hat and draws them (I think this hat is actually a computer now) then gives them their 1st choice if it is available, then their 2nd choice, and so on. You usually get screwed and end up with your 13th choice. Every year, Bill Burig (and his computer) end up p1ssing off a lot of students, and he ends up having to remove toilet paper from his trees.

If you're in a fraternity, you don't have to deal with this housing lottery thing. I think this is part of the reason a lot of guys join fraternities.

Housing Costs:
Different dorms and apartments cost different amounts depending on their location, and whether they're a single, double, or triple, or a 1 bedroom, 2 bedroom one bath, or 2 bedroom 2 bath apartment.

Dorm Dues:
On top of the Housing Costs, you usually end up having to pay dorm dues, decided by your dorm council. I never quite figured out if they did anything useful with this money other than print up some lousy t-shirts. At least in fraternities, they use your dues for something useful like beer.



P.S. I can't believe "FR3NCH T1CKLER" actually got flagged as an objectionable word! That is SO COOL!!!






Recommended: Yes