Western alumna Kat Wilson remembers Colonial Courts as a community where students felt connected enough to knock on each other’s doors to ask for milk or eggs, a community where students bonded simply because they were neighbors.

Providing international and visiting faculty with more housing close to campus is causing this student community of apartments and cottages to dwindle.

Colonial Courts, located on Normal Drive across the street from Southwest Hall, is a group of six cottages and three apartment buildings where many Western students have lived.

Western has been buying up the properties in Colonial Courts for two years. Now only two apartment buildings have student residents living there, according to information collected by Deborah Wilkins, chief of staff and general counsel.

The university now owns all of the properties in Colonial Courts after the Board of Regents approved the purchase of the last four cottages on July 31.

Residents have fond memories of Colonial Courts.

“It wasn’t the place; it was the people living there,” said Wilson, who lived in Colonial Courts from 2005 to 2007.

Wilson said she remembers residents hanging out together on their porches and having bonfires outside.

“There was always something going on there,” she said.

Somerset senior Emily Fox, who lives in a Colonial Courts apartment, also remembers hanging out with other residents.

“We would have airsoft gunfights,” Fox said.

There are fewer interactions now that only one other building besides hers has student residents, she said.

Bryan Anselm, a senior from Carmel, Ind., who lives with Fox, agreed.

“It’s quieter, but it’s not the same,” he said.

The four cottages will be renovated starting in September and will house international and visiting scholars, Provost Barbara Burch said.

Two cottages purchased previously by the university are already being used for visiting faculty after undergoing renovation last year, according to information provided by Wilkins.

Burch said it’s important for international faculty to live close to campus so they won’t need transportation back and forth all the time.

Burch said Western faculty are treated to convenient housing when they travel to universities abroad.

“It’s important for us to reciprocate when we have visiting faculty,” she said.

Bowling Green senior Drew Bewley, who lives in a Colonial Courts apartment, said it’s somewhat frustrating that some students had to leave Colonial Courts for Western to house faculty.

“If they needed it for a new building, that’s understandable, but to move one group out just to move another group in doesn’t seem right,” Bewley said.

Many of the houses previously intended for international faculty were lost when construction began on the College of Education and Behavioral Sciences building, according to the Board of Regents motion.

The two apartments that still house students are leased until May, Anselm said. After that, he and Fox are graduating and don’t plan to live in Colonial Courts anymore.

Western plans to renovate or raze the apartment buildings in the future in an effort to continue building an international community in that location, according to information provided by Wilkins.