Adams Closes Dining Hall to First-Years

Hungry first-years living on the outskirts of the Yard may be forced to take the few extra steps to Annenberg after a new set of restrictions for the Adams House dining hall went into effect last night.

While first-years were once allowed the same access to the conveniently-located dining hall as other non-Adamsians, the new restrictions will prevent first-years from eating in Adams at lunch and dinner, unless escorted by an in-House host. “We didn’t want Adams to be a satellite Annenberg,” said House Committee co-chair Joshua A. Barro ’05, who met with the Adams House Masters to devise the new restrictions.

Though Adams has routinely enforced interhouse restrictions at peak meal times to reduce historically large crowds, the new policy is the first to target first-year diners specifically and the first to apply during all lunch and dinner dining hours.

“It was just getting to the point where the dining hall was constantly crowded,” Barro said. “Blockmates couldn’t find three seats together, so we finally looked at the data splits and realized the problem was freshmen.”

House Master Judith Palfrey said that dining hall data revealed that approximately one-third of Adams diners were first-years.

“It was becoming too much of a strain on the dining hall staff to prepare that much extra food,” she said.

According to Barro, 1,100 meals went to first-years last week as compared to the 1,800 consumed by House residents.

“More freshmen eat in Adams than the other 11 houses combined,” he said. After meeting with HoCo members, Palfrey decided it was “the right moment to put some restrictions on the freshmen.”

But first-years living closer to Mass. Ave. than the Science Center are not pleased at the prospect of making the trip to Annenberg on a more regular basis. Brian S. Gillis ’07, a Greenough resident, wrote in an e-mail that the new restrictions had him “hopping mad.”

But Pennypacker resident Adam G. Zalisk ’07, who said he had grown accustomed to dining in Adams five to six times a week, said he understood the reason for the change.

“There definitely were a few nights where it really was quite crowded in Adams,” he said.

“It’s tough for the people in the Union dorms because Adams was in such a convenient location, but now we’ll take the longer trek to Annenberg, which hopefully won’t be as bad with the warmer weather,” he said.

And Eve P. Drucker ’07, who lives in Greenough, said she recognized that the swell of first-year diners could make for an “unpleasant environment.”

Adams House resident Margaret F. Shipstead ’05 paused between bites of dinner in a crowd-free dining hall at around 5:15 p.m. last night to explain the problem.

“Some nights I would struggle to squeeze into a table and when I finally sat down I’d hear people saying ‘This is so much better than Annenberg,’” she said.

She added that first-years should enjoy the Annenberg experience while they can because the dining hall is closed to all upper-class students.

Another Adams diner, Bryan Y. Ho ’06, said the new policy “kind of makes us look even more elitist, but there really were nights where there seriously was no place to eat. Sometimes I’d be forced to eat in a friend’s room.”

But first-years who will be joining Adams at the end of March when House lottery results are announced will be welcomed into the community and the dining hall.

First-years assigned to Adams will receive special stickers to affix to their IDs that will allow them full Adams dining privileges.

“We’re getting ready to welcome the newest members to the house,” Palfrey said. “With the new restrictions we’ll really have time to clean up the dining hall and make it sparkle so there will be plenty of room for them.”

Barro said yesterday that the dining hall will still be open to first-years for breakfast.

—Staff writer Wendy D. Widman can be reached at widman@fas.harvard.edu.