Freshmen experience 'A Taste of Prospect'

There was no turning freshmen away from the Street last Friday night. In fact, they were welcomed with open arms.

As part of the "A Taste of Prospect" initiative, all members of the Class of 2008 were given the opportunity to sign up for the chance to eat at one of the Prospect Ave. eating clubs.

After signing up for the initiative in their residential colleges, the roughly 330 freshmen who participated were randomly assigned to one of 10 eating clubs to eat dinner on Sept. 17. The Ivy Club did not participate in the initiative.

For freshmen Erica Duke and Audrey Burgress, both in Wilson College, the luck of the draw meant dinner in the Princeton Tower Club.

"It was totally random, but it's kind of cool that I got this one because I want to do theater, and I hear this is the theater club," said Burgress, who had never been in Tower before.

The sudden deluge of freshmen upon Tower meant a wait in line, but Duke and Burgress didn't mind — the food ended up being worth the wait.

"It's good and, compared to Wilcox, it's amazing," Burgess said.

"Even the bread's good!" Duke chimed in.

Dessert was the highlight of the night for both girls, who welcomed Tower's wide sampling of sweet delicacies.

"They have fruit! Real fruit!" exclaimed Duke.

The point of the initiative, however, was not to make freshmen jealous of their upperclass peers and their wide range of dessert offerings. Rather, it was an effort to showcase the eating clubs as welcoming and inclusive parts of the Princeton community, Tower Club President Eric Czervionke '05 said.

"The idea is to show freshmen [another side of the Street] and to make freshmen comfortable with going to the eating clubs," he said.

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The initiative grew out of conversations with President Tilghman, Czervionke said, in which there was concern that "some people had a lot of anxiety" about coming to the Street.

Anxiety among the younger classes regarding the Street is not helpful to any club, and so Tower was only too happy to sign up for the initiative, Czervionke said.

"From our perspective, it's great because all of the clubs feel that if the Street as a whole is more healthy, it's better for all of us," he said. "If [a club] were to go under [because of poor attendance], it's not good for any of us."

Elisabeth Merrill '08, who dined at Quadrangle Club, said that though she was unsure whether it was a "typical" night at the Street, the initiative was "pretty effective in making the eating clubs — at least Quad — seem more approachable as [it] allowed us to meet some of the members and get their opinions on what their clubs were like firsthand."

Merrill, who had only been to the Street once in the past, for lawn parties, acknowledged that though she may head out to the Street only slightly more often, "Quad at least looks much friendlier."

Burgress and Duke disagreed that there was any element of intimidation in the Street — both of them had been out several times.

"I don't think that there was an element of intimidation before this," said Burgress adding that, in her view, the point was to expose another aspect of the Street.

"I think this was meant to give us an idea of what it's like to eat at the clubs, but I don't think it has any overlap into Thursday and Saturday nights," she said.

Some members were concerned that certain freshmen were coming to "eat and leave" without taking the time to interact with upperclassmen.

But that wasn't Merrill's experience. She interacted with three upperclassmen, who approached her and her friends, and was greeted by Quad's president — who had memorized the names of all the freshmen coming for dinner at his club.

"Basically, the degree of interaction and 'bridging the gap' really depended on people's personalities and whether they felt comfortable going and introducing themselves to complete strangers," Merrill conceded. "Some people were at least making an effort to talk to us frosh."

The point resonated with one Quad senior who said upperclassmen bore the responsibility to introduce themselves to the freshmen.

"If they had just come, they would have sat by themselves, but we went and came and sat down by them," he said. "We had a conversation with our freshmen."

The Inter-Club Council meets today to discuss how well the initiative went and whether there will be another round of freshmen dining at the eating clubs.

In retrospect, Tower president Czervionke had hoped that all clubs could have participated in the initiative.

"The whole point was to be as inclusive as possible and it kind of defeats the purpose that some clubs [chose not to participate]," he said.

Colonial Club president Tracy Solomon '05, who took a lead role in organizing the initiative, said she hoped another round of 'A Taste of Prospect' could be organized. "We're going to see, and hopefully," she said. "But we have to evaluate first."

Czervionke said he too was open to the idea of another round of 'A Taste of Prospect' "if the other clubs are happy with how this went," noting that "this isn't costing us anything: Shirley Tilghman is footing the bill."

For Czervionke, it boiled down to this: "If it makes people more comfortable to come to the clubs, to come out to the Street, then that's a good thing."

From the freshmen point of view, perhaps Merrill summed up the initiative best: "It was a nice introduction to a particular club, but it didn't really show the character of the Street as a whole," she said.