Dillard University ceiling collapse, mold spark student housing crisis

Students at Dillard University held up posters showing photos of their mold-infested dorms and campus apartments, hoping to be recognized by alumni who were visiting the Gentilly campus Thursday for an alumni association meeting.

Throughout the meeting, which kicked off the university’s homecoming weekend, students in suits and business-professional dresses stood silently in the front of the room, facing the audience with pictures of vents, ceilings, walls and furniture covered with dark blue and black mold. 

The student demonstration comes more than a month after a Dillard student was injured when the ceiling collapsed in her apartment within Gentilly Gardens, an on-campus apartment complex where many juniors and seniors live. Several dozen students who lived in the complex were forced by the university to relocate, and many said they were placed in other on-campus dorms and apartments that had mold and structural damage. 

At the meeting, members of the school’s Student Government Association (SGA) called on the alumni association to advocate on their behalf with the university. They also demanded that the administration address the dangers that students face within the run-down, mold-ridden structures.

“We cannot continue to sit in rooms reminiscing about how wonderful Dillard used to be while overlooking the realities that students today are facing,” said Madison Cox, a junior, who is president of SGA at Dillard.

Dillard, the oldest historically Black college in Louisiana, is well-known for its College of Nursing and its newly begun Masters of Science in Nursing program. It has been recognized as a leading producer of physics majors, particularly more female physics majors than almost any other Historically Black College or University (HBCU) in the nation. Every spring, its graduates walk in their blue gowns down the university’s renowned Avenue of the Oaks.

But the school has struggled for several years with declining enrollment, reduced federal funding and, like many universities across the country, burgeoning operational expenses. Students say they’ve felt the impacts of these challenges, and they’re worried about the university’s future.

Dillard’s SGA is launching its own initiative, called Operation BLEU, which asks the university to disclose to students key information about finances and plans for the future. The SGA initiative calls for “transparency, accountability, institutional renewal and meaningful student engagement,” Cox said at the meeting on Thursday.

To launch Operation BLEU, the SGA has created a list of questions for university administrators about campus housing, enrollment and long-term fiscal planning. The students have asked the university to respond to their queries in writing, organize a student town hall and provide a “comprehensive institutional recovery roadmap,” Cox said.

Members of the alumni association gave Cox a standing ovation when she finished speaking.

“We are all very, very supportive of that work that needs to be done,” said Tiffani Moore, the president of the alumni association and a Dillard graduate from the class of 2002.

A crisis, a report and a new position

Questions about the safety of student housing at Dillard came to a head after the partial ceiling collapse in mid-September. A month later, student De’Juan Fuel submitted a “crisis report” to Dillard administrators requesting “immediate intervention and accountability” from the university’s president and board of trustees.

Students did not receive clear communications about the collapse or the injured student, and were not sure whether they were safe in their apartments, said Fuel, a senior at Dillard who lived in Gentilly Gardens during the partial ceiling collapse and authored the crisis report. 

“It’s been, mentally, a lot,” said Fuel.“I’ve had moments where I cannot sleep. I’m waking up feeling ill in the morning. I’m trying to force myself to focus on academics.”

After the collapse, contractors inspected the building and determined that it was unsafe. The university told about three dozen students, including Fuel, that they needed to move out of Gentilly Gardens in three phases that required some to relocate within the next 48 hours and others following in the subsequent month. 

The relocation timeline and instructions were confusing throughout the process, students said. The instructions changed several times and many students said they received contradictory orders about where to move and when. 

The university also threatened disciplinary action against students who did not move out by their deadline, though many students were reassigned to apartments or dorms that had previously been marked “offline,” or out of use, due to mold, lack of ventilation, or structural damage.

Mold thrives in damp, poorly ventilated spaces, especially in buildings that have sprung roof or window leaks. People who live in moldy rooms can experience skin rashes, constant sneezing, watery or itchy eyes, nasal congestion, and trouble breathing.

Ahrianna Vicks, a senior at Dillard, lived next door to the apartment where the ceiling collapsed, and was part of the first phase of relocations with a move-out deadline of Oct. 18. Vicks struggled to juggle her academic responsibilities, including midterms, with hurried packing. Then she and her boxes ended up in another on-campus residence with visible mold.

Even before the collapse, Vicks had been frustrated that she had been assigned to Gentilly Gardens, which she believed was supposed to be moved “offline” this upcoming spring. The move to a moldy dorm also bothered her, she said, because it seems like the university had not thought ahead about placing students in safe living conditions. 

“It feels like reactive solutions instead of proactive solutions,” she said. “If the incident didn’t happen, we would still be in our current housing.”

The university’s relocation of students from Gentilly Gardens feels like a slap in the face to some students, who pay up to $37,000 each year to attend Dillard, according to a “cost of attendance” page on the university’s website. Apartments in the dilapidated Gentilly Gardens cost $8,867 per semester for room and board.

“I’m paying you all this money to live in conditions that actively affect my health … in a space that is literally inhospitable,” said Nailah Baker, a junior at Dillard. Baker has asthma and has suffered with mold infestations in multiple housing arrangements at Dillard, including Gentilly Gardens, she said.

Student morale and the school’s reputation have both taken a long-term hit, Baker believes.

“I don’t even know if we’re going to get to our bicentennial [in 2069] because of the lack of care for the students and buildings on campus,” she said.

Dillard University did not respond to questions from The Lens about why students moved into rooms marked “offline,” and whether the university has addressed specific health and safety concerns raised by students.

But spokesperson Tara Cunningham sent a statement noting that the university’s administration had received the crisis report and was “working to minimize disruption” to students’ academic work while relocating them.

“The Board of Trustees and university leadership are reviewing [the report] carefully and taking the concerns raised seriously,” Cunningham wrote. “Student safety is Dillard University’s highest priority.”

The university created a new position, “Executive in Residence for Student Experience and Campus Renewal,” and appointed Roland Pickens, a Dillard alumni and former trustee, to serve in that role. One of Pickens’ immediate responsibilities as executive in residence is to oversee the Gentilly Gardens relocation plan, he announced at the alumni association meeting on Thursday.

Pickens, a 1985 Dillard graduate, recently retired from a career as a healthcare executive, including as the chief operating officer of San Francisco General Hospital. But his retirement plans changed when Dillard called, he said.

“If things were going well, I would be sitting on that beach that I planned to be on right about now,” Pickens said. “My mere presence should be an indication that there’s an acknowledgement that things are not well. But I’m a person of my word, and I’m here to listen.”