Will Rice College is a residential college at Rice University in Houston, Texas. The original building called South Hall opened in 1912. In 1957, Rice adopted a residential college system, and Will Rice was created around the existing dormitory and named for William M. Rice, Jr., the nephew of the university's founder, William Marsh Rice. The second oldest of the nine residential colleges at Rice, Will Rice was originally an all-male dormitory and became co-ed in 1977. Will Rice currently consists of two dormitories, Old Dorm and New Dorm, and a commons area which surround an open quad. Will Rice's symbol is the phoenix and the college is known among its residents and alumni as "the college of gods and goddesses."
Will Rice is also often referred to in writing as WRC.
Traditions
Will Rice's primary tradition is focused around the university's annual Beer Bike competition between the residential colleges. Will Rice has long dominated the event's alumni race, and regularly fields strong men's and women's teams. As a result, it is the only college to have swept all three races which it has done on three occasions — 1983, 1986, and 1999.
Will Rice New Dorm includes two sections, the 80s and 90s, that face away from the main quad and are closer to Hanszen College and Sid Richardson College than they are to parts of Will Rice Old Dorm. Each spring the residents in these sections secede and form Albert Patrick College (the "APC"), named after the man who killed the university's founder. The secession is often celebrated by a College Night hosted by the APC.
Will Rice Old Dorm is unique in that it contains the only two all-male floors on campus and one of the two all-female floors (the other being at Jones College ). This tradition stems from the fact that there is only one bathroom per floor, as the dorm was not originally built to be co-ed.
Government
The elected student government body of the college is called the Diet (traditionally pronounced like diet, the food regimen, rather than diet, the legislative assembly). The Diet administers a university-sponsored and fee-augmented budget of approximately $30,000 which supports social, athletic and other programs for its approximately 300 resident and non-resident members.
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