Alex Osuch and Tom Hintze, two senior Writing Seminars majors, make the trek out to Dell House every Wednesday for a poetry seminar. One day, though they insisted the trip wasn't too arduous, they felt the trip warranted a rest stop. They pulled in to the recently opened 7-Eleven on North Charles.
Dell House, a converted apartment building on the corner of North Charles and 29th Street, is currently home to many of the humanities departments that used to fill Gilman Hall. The school acquired the building in 2003, but it remained primarily residential until the Gilman Hall renovations got underway.
One of the main reasons that Dell House was chosen as a temporary office space for the humanities departments is because it provided a single location to house the many departments. Professors noted that this has allowed them to maintain their contacts across departments.
"I hold dual appointments with German and the Humanities, so my being able to hop in the elevator and visit those departments has been helpful," Eckart said.
Departments currently residing at Dell House include History, Classics, German and Romance Languages, Near Eastern Studies and Philosophy, among others.
The response of faculty and students to the temporary arrangements has been mixed. The primary concerns among faculty and students have been the distance of the building from the main campus and the limited office space.
"It's certainly not ideal, but it works for the two years that we have to be here," Philosophy Professor Eckart Forster said.
Professors and students have had to be more flexible in order to coordinate their schedules.
"I have some classes in the library, so I will often stay on campus to meet students there," Egyptology Professor Richard Jasnow said.
"[Dell House] is certainly out of the way, especially for undergraduates who don't have many classes or offices here. I understand that it's more difficult for them."
Senior Amelia Whitman said that the travel distance to the Dell House has affected both her motivation to go to class and her relationships with professors.
"I think it's also harder since professors prefer not to come [to the Dell House for office hours]," she said.
Despite its distance, Dell House has some advantages over Gilman Hall, at least the old Gilman Hall. Whitman said that Dell House seminar rooms are better than the classrooms in Gilman, especially Gilman's underground classrooms that were often hot and noisy.
"The round tables in the seminar rooms [in the Dell House] provide a much better learning atmosphere. I think the Gilman classrooms were more appropriate for lectures," she said.
Hintze agreed that Dell House was a unique environment.
"It feels a lot less like school. For some classes that might be problematic, but I think it might actually be good for some of the more creative classes," he said.
Professors share cramped office space with each other in the former apartment building. It is not uncommon for a single room in Dell House to serve as the office for three professors.
"I'm certainly a bit on top of them [other professors] here. This was designed as a residential space, so it's not easy to comfortably fit all these people and office equipment into this space," Jasnow said.
Many of the problems, like lack of space and the distance from campus, were anticipated. Others were a surprise to everyone.
"The switch from Gilman to Dell House went well, except for the mice and roaches," Jennifer Deman, a budget specialist in the history department at Hopkins. said.
- Additional reporting by Doyeun Kim
