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Highlights

• Purdue's Housing operation is the fourth largest in the country and the largest with no live-in requirement for any students at any level in the University. Approximately 30% of the student body lives in the 15 housing units on campus. For the past 10 years, 81-87% of each entering class has been housed in one of Purdue's housing options.

• Spring semester GPA for all undergraduate students in residence halls and graduate houses was higher than all off-campus students, class by class, i.e., freshmen on campus vs. freshmen off-campus, etc.

• During the fiscal year 2003-04, University Residences served three million meals in our halls. Purdue's Food Stores Operation can store up to 50 semi-trailer loads of food at ten degrees below zero. That's over two million pounds of food.

• The Union Club Hotel, the largest in the Lafayette-West Lafayette area, completed a $9.5 million renovation of the 131 rooms in its North Wing in January 2002.

• The Faculty Fellow program involves 170 faculty and staff on a volunteer basis in the undergraduate residence halls, making it one of the largest faculty involvement programs in the country.

• Over 4,600 residential life programs were offered to University Residences students during the academic year 2003-04.

• Purdue Village administers a language school program to approximately 400 participants annually.

• Boiler TV is the University Residences' cable service that offers 30 TV channels, FM radio signals, and Boiler TV that provides five daily movies and announcements to residents, academic campus subscribers, and visitors to campus. Like C-Span, Boiler TV periodically broadcasts live campus events.

• University Residences is among the top ten busiest summer conference operators in the country.

• The Black Cultural Center has one of the finest collections of books and periodicals relating to the African American experience in the country. The BCC sponsored 58 programs during the 2003-04 fiscal year. The BCC was featured in 129 articles in print media, including one article in Jet Magazine featuring the Brown Sisters' appearance at Purdue as part the 50th anniversary celebration of Brown vs. Board of Education, which ended segregation in public schools.

• Elliott Hall of Music was designed by the same architect who designed Radio City Music Hall. With 6,025 seats, it is one of the largest proscenium theaters in the world. Elliott Hall of Music houses the oldest university public radio in the country, WBAA. The Joe Tiller Show and The Gene Keady Show are produced weekly by Hall of Music productions in the television studio located in the Hall of Music. Hall of Music Productions won six ADDY awards, six TELLY awards, and two AURORA awards this past year for its work in video production. The Hall of Music Productions produces over 1,000 events annually, with over 95% of them having a direct tie to the life of the University. Nearly 100 students are employed annually by the Hall of Music.

• The Purdue Memorial Union has the largest ballrooms in the Lafayette-West Lafayette area and has the largest indoor holiday tree in Indiana each year. PMU Banquet Services catered 3,982 events during the 2003-04 fiscal year; 18,651 events were held in the Purdue Memorial Union and Stewart Center. The Purdue Student Union Board sponsored 186 programs during the 2003-04 academic year with 44,309 in attendance. The PMU Recreation Center had 97,000 games of bowling played and over 10,500 hours of billiards played. The food service venues in the Purdue Memorial Union served 1,168,000 customers during the 2003-04 fiscal year. Each day, 14,000 people come through the doors of the Purdue Memorial Union.

• Residence Hall Council has 25 elected hall officers who serve as a liaison between students and administrators, while each hall (12) has an independent student organization with an annual budget in excess of $25,000.

Source: Housing and Food Services Business Office