Rooted in a vision developed by Cornell faculty, West Campus houses extend opportunities for student growth beyond the doors of classrooms and labs and into residence halls. In-house events and resources weave together living and learning within magnificent facilities.

By 2008, West Campus will include five new residential houses, each named in memory of a prominent Cornell professor from the past. Alice Cook House opened in 2004; Carl Becker House opened in 2005, and Hans Bethe House opened in 2007. Two more houses will open by 2008. House 4, Keeton House, pays tribute to Cornell biologist William T. Keeton.

Residents have face-to-face conversations with distinguished visiting guests, like Janet Reno '60 or Bill Nye '77, and get to know Cornell professors over dinner. They can stroll downstairs for a weekly tutoring session with a teaching assistant in organic chemistry, or walk down the hall to chat with a graduate student about law school. They can step into the Common Room for a mini-concert or to hear about study abroad opportunities.

In every facility, an in-house dean and assistant dean, 30 house fellows, and 6 graduate resident fellows provide advice and get to know student residents. Students may choose to live in a West Campus house after their first year of study. Each house features well-equipped living spaces with a choice of singles, doubles, and suites. Public spaces directly support the program vision with common rooms for large gatherings, seminar and meeting rooms for smaller gatherings, and study, computing, and music practice rooms. An all new Noyes Community Recreation Center will serve as the social and recreational hub of West Campus.

View a project timeline and renderings of the West Campus project.

Find out what visiting guests say about West Campus

[ Recent West Campus Visitors ]

Each year distinguished guests visit Alice H. Cook House, Carl L. Becker House and Hans Bethe House on West Campus—where Cornell's new house system is transforming student residential life. Students live and learn with accomplished visitors representing a wide range of careers and professions.

Fall 2007

John Ahearn '73, artist
Mansoor Alam, retired diplomat, chairman of FLAME (Friends of Literacy and Mass Education)
Hanan Ashrawi, scholar and political activist
Balufu Bakupa-Kanyinda, writer, director and actor
Rustom Bharucha, writer, director and cultural critic
Frederick Brown, artist
Peter Cole, poet, translator and scholar
Angela Davis, activist-scholar
Jihan El-Tahri, award-winning writer, film director and producer
Joy Haven and Jorge Fuentes, members of New York Baroque Dance Company
Alex Kotlowitz, activist and journalist
Lisa Krauthamer '04, recruitment director for Teach For America
Andrei Krylov, guitarist and songwriter
Carol Kuntz '84, homeland defense chair, National Defense University; former special advisor for national security affairs to Vice President Dick Cheney
Helen de Michiel, filmmaker
Hassan Rabaa, chemist, University of Kenitra, Morocco
Rick Ray, filmmaker
Marianne Scott, executive director, Our Voices Together
Simon Shaheen, artist, soloist and leader of Al-Qantara
Henry Threadgill, composer
Bassam Tibi, political scientist and A.D. White Professor at Large
Seth Wanye, Ghanaian ophthalmologist, United for Sight

Previous West Campus Visitors