In response to The Weekly’s article about the renovation of the Lundgren House, we would like to offer another part of the story.

For the 2009-2010 school year, we lived in Lundgren House as part of Residential Life’s ILS program. In the spring of 2010, we reapplied to live in the house after already being guaranteed the spot by Resiential Life. We were accepted into the ILS program again in April 2010, but were surprised to find out we weren’t living in Lundgren, but in College View as part of the program.

Residential Life then told us that the college was taking Lundgren to renovate it. At this point in the process we had no other housing options, with off-campus and apartments already closed. Residential Life told us they had only found out about the move right before us, though The Weekly article mentions the move first in 2009.

What has most frustrated us was the lack of notification within the college about this move. There was an obvious breakdown of communication between departments and with students, though the students had to bear the results.

We could have worked with Residential Life to find a solution if we had known earlier about the move. Instead, we had a frustrating circumstance and could find no answers from the administration in the entire process, nor access to any administrators who could answer our questions.

As students, we felt severely overlooked and undervalued in the entire decision to renovate Lundgren House. As part of the ILS program we have served the college by hosting events to foster community and provided a sub-free environment for students, often partnering with PLEDGE. To be so easily cast aside by this administration in this manner has been deeply hurtful and disrespectful both to us as students and to our organization.

Laura Walker ’11, Colleen Ganser ’11, Kendra Kesty ’11, Michelle Dietz ’11, Annika Johanson ’11, Julia Tindell ’13, Angela Chang ‘13

Prepare Ministries ILS House