The Familiarization and Adaptation to the Surroundings and Environs of Tech FASETT) Orientation and Freshman Experience (a freshman-only dorm life program to "encourage friendships and a feeling of social involvement") programs, which seek to help acclimate new students to their surroundings and foster a greater sense of community.
Dr. Handler set about raising money, renovating dorms, invigorating the sports program and diversifying the student body, which was about 70 percent Jewish, with recruiting efforts and more subtle initiatives to underscore Brandeis's nonsectarian foundational principles.
The report proposed several initiatives — a gender-neutral dorm and a Safe Spaces program that would designate rooms on every dorm floor where gay and minority students could retreat if needed.
These measures include bans on candles, skillets, toaster ovens and halogen lamps in dorm rooms; a three-year program to provide more fire-resistant mattresses; and fines ranging from $250 to $500 for students who commit such violations as tampering with fire-safety equipment, failing to leave a dorm during a fire alarm or using an unauthorized appliance.
In 1999 Shawn Fanning emerged from his dorm room with Napster, a program that let people share music files over the Internet.
It has also installed swipe locks in first-year dorms and instituted a "Gotcha" program where the staff checks student residence hall rooms to ensure they remain locked.
Students in the ACC program lived in dorms on campus and pledged to speak Chinese all the time with classmates and roommates.
But the daughter of celeb TV doctor Mehmet Oz also penned "The Dorm Room Diet: The 10-Step Program for Creating a Healthy Lifestyle Plan That Really Works" and helped found HealthCorps, a nonprofit that promotes teen health.
In August, the state created a program that provides separate dorms in five prisons for honorably discharged military veterans who have no more than three years left on their sentences and who volunteer for it.
Now such programs are typically under the aegis of individual universities, which put the students up in dorms and bring in undergrads or program alums as residential camp counselors.
