la montagne

I have a question for any past or present MacGregor residents:

Which are the more social entries? Does it change from year to year? How does one determine which are more social? Are the more social ones harder to get into during entry rush?

rainynightstarz

I want MacGregor tooo!!!
You can be in my entry! PSETTING PARTIES lol
I don't think you have to worry about the entry stuff till in house lottery. The ones in the tall tower has really really nice views.

molliebatmit

When I was there, A, D, and G were generally considered to be most social, in no particular order.

After everybody gets a final dorm assignment, each dorm will hold in-house rush. In MacGregor, that means that all the freshmen are divided into groups and rotate through each entry meeting residents. Each entry will talk about what they like to do as a group, and you can ask them questions and talk and get to know them. (And, of course, you're welcome to wander around entries prior to in-house, which is probably a more honest way to get to know what an entry is really like.)

After in-house, each freshman ranks the entries from 1-9, and each entry says "yes", "no", or "indifferent" to each freshman. All of the responses get fed into a computer, which runs a lottery to "maximize house happiness." So it's relatively harder to get into the more popular entries (which are not necessarily the most social entries, but often are), but if you make friends with residents of that entry and know they're going to say "yes" for you, it is easier to get in.

(Also, rainynightstarz, just FYI -- don't let anybody in A or B entry hear that you're super-excited about the view -- that's one of the quickest ways to get A or B to say "no" to you, if they think you're more interested in the view than in the community. )

rainynightstarz

thanks for the tip Mollie. Having a nice view only goes so far; for example, Baker is not one of my top choice.

@Mollie: Did you ever feel that you missed out on the college experience by not having a roommate freshmen year?
Is there a In-Entry rush to pick people in your suite?

LauraN

Ugh, I WISH BC would get its act together and write a program to do freshman floor assignments. It would get rid of SO MUCH drama, and make me really happy.

*sigh*

PiperXP

Don't pick MacGregor based off the fact that they're mostly singles. Pick whatever dorm based off personality =DD. Seriously, I can't emphasize that enough. (That said, if MacGregor fits your personality, go for it! They're pretty awesome..)

Also, the no roommate thing - I didn't have a roommate freshman year either, I don't feel like I missed out on anything. EC is mostly singles, so people aren't in their rooms a whole lot - you just wander to the lounge if you want to be social, and then when you feel like killing the world (or something) you just shut your door =D

curious8582008

How do students get room assignments after dorm rush and floor rush? Do you just walk around the rooms and yell, "Dibs!" in one that you like?

PiperXP

No, they are assigned to you, at least in East Campus. After floor rush, you turn in your preferences (as to what floor you want) and the next morning your room assignment will be posted. (Frosh don't really have much choice in the *actual* rooms as the sophomores, juniors, and seniors pick their rooms at the end of the year.)

molliebatmit

I definitely don't feel that way, but I'm not the roommate type at all -- I'm a little finicky and compulsive, and I don't think I would have handled having a roommate all that well.

But I certainly wasn't isolated -- my next-door neighbor was also a freshman, and we considered ourselves roommates who lived in different rooms. We spent most of our time at home with our doors open, either in the hallway or in one room or the other, and we each basically had permission to barge into the other's room at any time.

For what it's worth, I do agree that getting a single shouldn't be anybody's first priority, much like prestige shouldn't be anybody's first priority when looking at colleges. But if you like MacGregor (or any of the other dorms that have lots of singles for freshmen), then by all means get psyched about having a single.

rainynightstarz, I didn't mean to bang on you for the view comment. I was sort of teasing, but it is probably the biggest A-Entry pet peeve during in-house rush.

So I'll elaborate on what Piper said. This is specifically for MacGregor, but I'm sure other dorms have similar mechanisms.

Upperclassmen pick their rooms at the end of the preceding school year, so only some certain number of rooms are open in each suite for freshmen. There are rules regarding the gender composition of each suite -- some suites are designated single-sex, so all of the freshmen in those suites have to be the appropriate gender, and in mixed-sex suites, there have to be at least 2 members of each gender (i.e. you can have 3/3 and 4/2 and 2/4, but not 5/1 or 1/5). So each room can be somewhat restricted by gender.

Once the entry gets the list of people they're getting, the entry chair sits down with the house rooming chair and they assign freshmen to rooms based on where they think each person will fit in the best. (For example, my next-door "roommate" and I weren't next door to each other by accident -- we were deliberately put next to each other because the entry chair thought we'd like each other.)

I think most of the dorms probably do this similarly, where upperclassmen assign freshmen to open rooms based on both issues like gender balance and also where they feel a certain person will be happiest.

EDIT:
It actually caused a lot of drama when it was introduced my junior year (the year I was rush chair, yay), because the previous system benefited the popular entries, and the popular entries howled when it was changed.

Under the previous system, which was done manually in rounds, each entry got the preference sheets of all the freshmen who had ranked them first, chose the people they wanted, and returned the sheets of people they didn't want. As you can imagine, the entries which had a lot of people rank them first made out like bandits, because they got to explicitly pick every single person they wanted. The more unpopular entries couldn't fill their entries with people who had ranked them first, and had to fill the entry with people who had ranked them second... third... seventh. Under the algorithm, the entries have much less say in who they get, which is probably better for the house as a whole. (As I've previously mentioned, I lived in two of the "popular" entries, so I howled with the rest of them when the system changed. )

LauraN

That's only true at EC. EVERY dorm has a different system. In BC, after you turn in your preferences, you're assigned to a floor. Then the floor works out where everyone lives in whatever system they want. The frosh are obviously limited to the open rooms, since the upperclassman have already moved in, but for example on my floor, the frosh basically get together and discuss amongst themselves who is rooming with who in which suite. If there's disagreement, it's resolved over rock/paper/scissors. Actually.

PiperXP

Ah, interesting, thanks for correcting me =P The difference probably exists because of the suite situation vs. one long floor. Particular rooms in EC don't determine who you spend your time around because there's just one big lounge.

la montagne

Lol, another MacGregor question, though residents of other dorms may want to answer as well: who cleans the kitchens and bathrooms?

molliebatmit

The dorm cleaning staff cleans the bathrooms and the lounges and vacuums the floors.

Kitchens have to be cleaned by suite residents. In practice, some suites are very clean and always have clean dishes and never any past-expiration-date food, etc., while other suites... have other priorities. It's up to each suite to decide how to deal with those issues.

PiperXP

Do all dorms have cleaning staff? EC does too. (I think bathrooms in Simmons are cleaned by residents, though... but not sure.)

la montagne

*whew* That's relieving. My friend at NYU was relating to me his suitemate bathroom-cleaning woes the other day (there are 4 people who are supposed to switch off cleaning each week, but he's the only one who ever does it so the bathroom only gets cleaned once every 4 weeks. =/) and it kind of grossed me out. (He also related to me all the problems he's had with his roommate, which, though it probably shouldn't, pushes me towards MacGregor as a top choice.)