Please, won't you be my neighbor?

One chasm the Boston College community is trying to close is the one between off-campus students and their neighbors. Currently, BC struggles to maintain a peaceful coexistence with the people living around off-campus students.

This is not to say it is entirely the fault of the students. Many tenants already have the preconceived idea that living around students must be a negative experience, an office worker at the 2000 Commonwealth apartment complex says.

"It's up to students to change that myth, set a different standard or expectation," she says.

What is the best way to do this? Respect seems to be the word of the day.

"Be respectful," Jon Meunier, A&S '10 says.

The same office worker agrees.

"Treat others as you want to be treated, be respectful and courteous of your neighbors," she says.

There are many ways to achieve this, often through simple steps:

Turn down your music. Not everyone goes to bed in the early morning hours. A lot of the stereotypes of students living off campus revolve around noise level. There are reasons for quiet hours. Not everyone has the luxury of sleeping until the last minute before a 12 p.m. class the next afternoon, and the 8 a.m. hour is not just reserved for unfortunate freshman students. Remember the rest of the world does not live on your time schedule, so turning down the bass on your favorite playlist at midnight can go a long way.

"Don't have people float outside your apartment," Meunier says.

If you are going to have people over late at night, it is best to contain the get-together, especially if drinking is involved. "Keep your voice down at late hours," the office worker says.

Again, the world of the college student is entirely different from the world of the average working person. Your neighbor next door is not interested in hearing about your best friend's inebriation or the off-key shout of the BC fight song from a group of vocally powerful male athletes. Containing people to your apartment at least allows for a little more of a barrier between the noise and your neighbor.

Meet your neighbors. Sometimes, meeting your neighbors on move-in day can go further than it may seem. After meeting his neighbors, Meunier says, they requested he let them know if he ever planned to have a get-together where he lived, just so they were not caught off guard. Even if you are unable to establish a connection with your neighbor or have no desire to do so, a simple wave or a smile may be able to ease tension.

Culture in the city is different. The office worker at Commonwealth 2000 says she has run into many students at BC who are from suburbia or rural surroundings, and that they are sometimes in for a bit of a culture shock. In the city, people are closer together and keep to themselves living their lives. Most of all, people can hear you. No longer does the closest person live a couple of acres away. Moving out of a residence hall does not mean moving farther away from people.

All together, be respectful Parents living two doors down do not want their kids to find beer cans on the steps when they're going to school the next day. Also, the average person working a shift beginning at 8 a.m. does not consider 2 a.m. in the morning an early bed time. Hopefully by taking these and other courteous steps, the students at BC can move toward breaking the stereotype of the loud, disrespectful college student and show the world the intelligent, well-rounded people we are.

The best way to get involved if a student is interested in building a friendlier bond with the outside community before making the move off-campus is to get in touch with Boston College's Neighborhood Center.

An often-hidden resource to the untrained BC student eye, the Neighborhood Center is actually located on Washington Street in the heart of Brighton center. Created in 1995, the center serves the Allston-Brighton community, providing various resources (mainly student volunteer services) for families and elderly citizens living in the area.

The main volunteer efforts available to students through the center include: Service Days programs (one-day only service projects), tutoring programs, the Read Boston Program, English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) programs, elderly outreach and the Strong Women, Strong Girls program, which pairs up undergraduate women at BC with third, fourth, and fifth grade girls at local schools for mentoring.

The Neighborhood Center also raises money for an Allston-Brighton Boston College Community Fund, meant to provide grant money for programs and services in the area.

The Center is open Mondays through Fridays from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. Maria DiChiappari serves as the Neighborhood Center's director, and can be reached at 617-552-0446 or by e-mail at dichiapp@bc.edu.

"Our hope at the Boston College Neighborhood Center is that the Boston College community, students, staff and faculty will experience the richness of connecting, not only with peers within our own BC community, but additionally with the neighborhoods in which our university, and thus us, reside," DiChiappari said in a statement on the center's Web site, www.bc.edu/neighborhood.