<p>In about mid-May, you will get a piece of paper that will give you a chance to describe your living habits and where you would like to live. There will be about six choices or so and you get to rank them according to your preference. They usually do a pretty good job of putting people where they want but if you want a really popular place you may not get it. </p>
<p>They are switching around some of the designations for dorms next year so freshmen will no longer be in quiet dorms. I’ll try to summarize all the housing options for freshmens as best as I possibly can.</p>
<p>Smith- all-freshmen quads, with about 60 kids in each section. You will have a large number of people living in relatively small spaces. Great for meeting lots of different people and for having parties, not great if you want to work in your room or have a quiet night. Some people love it, some hate it. It just depends what you are looking for.</p>
<p>Page and Parker - these dorms are pretty similar so I’ll discuss them together. Both have rooms for all classes although freshmen make up the majority of inhabitants. Both have a fair number of loud parties, I know that page often has some bands play in the common room that can be heard across the other side of the puddle. Parker has a nice central location, Page is more removed but some rooms do have views of the puddle. Parker has 143 students and Page has 131.</p>
<p>Hedge- all-freshmen dorm with about 60 kids, decently sized rooms. I don’t know what it was like in the past but this year there are some loud parties on the guys’ floors but the girls’ floors are not too loud. Hedge also has a really good location between the library and p-gill. If I had to live in a dorm as a freshmen again, this would be one of my top choices.</p>
<p>Milliken - all-freshmen house with about 30 kids. Its located a bit farther away from the main area of campus but its definetely one of the closer houses. There will probably be a fair number of parties there but since its so small it really depends on the people who are living there each year. all in all a pretty nice house</p>
<p>Clason- all-freshmen chem free house with about 30 kids. This is where i currently live and although its not perfect, I like living here a lot. Since its chem-free, its generally quiet and clean, which is great sometimes but other times I wish we could have a few parties as a house. To me its seems more diverse because there are less stereotypical kids, but we also got a handful of weird guys as well. Generally, most people are pretty social despite living in a chem-free building, and a house most of us get along pretty well together. Clason is great for some people, but not a good choices if you want a very active social life involving lots of parties.</p>
<p>Rand- right now rand is the upper class party dorm but next year it will be “low-chem” filled with about half freshmen. They are supossed to be cleaning it up a lot, and I suspect they will some, but I’m not sure how much. I’m also not exactly sure how low-chem will be enforced so the designation may just be completely ridiculous. I think on paper it is supossed to have no kegs, no blueslipped parties, and no more than a thirty pack on each floor but it may not be enforced. I guess if you want to have a beer or two with your friends this may be a good place to aim for. I really have no idea how it will turn out but I’ll discover it with whoever ends up living there because I had bad lottery numbers and will be stuck living in Rand next year.</p>
<p>I think I described them all pretty thoroughly but check the bates website and the daily jolt for more info, although some of the information maybe not be updated for the changes next year.</p>
<p><a href=“http://bates.dailyjolt.com/housing.html[/url]”>http://bates.dailyjolt.com/housing.html</a>
<a href=“http://www.bates.edu/x47280.xml[/url]”>http://www.bates.edu/x47280.xml</a></p>