<p>i have a few questions regarding rotation…</p>
<p>1) how likely do people get into their first choice for houses?</p>
<p>2) what are some ways to increase your chances of getting into the house of ur choice?</p>
<p>3) if you don’t get placed into the house that you want to be in, is there a way to get into it eventually?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’m not exactly sure. Most people I know ended up in their first or second choice house, but there are people who ended up in their third or fourth choice. However, I know a number of people who ranked their current house fairly low, but ended up absolutely loving it. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Don’t try and game the system. Talk to people, let them know who you are. Very nearly everyone would be happy in several different houses, so don’t think that if you don’t get into ____ House, you’ll be completely miserable. Also, you REALLY shouldn’t be worrying about this yet. Really. I mean it. Rotation exists for a reason. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yeah. Every house has it’s own way of doing this, but you can apply for membership during the year. If you become a full member of a house, you can choose to live there. Lots of Techers are members of mutiple houses.</p>
<p>1) I’d say about 40-50% get their first choice house.</p>
<p>2) Answering this question would be a rotation violation.</p>
<p>3) You can always become a social or full member of any house after rotation. If you’re trying to become a full member, make sure you spend lots of time in that house so everyone knows you.</p>
<p>I will add one answer to #2: Spend lots of time meeting people during rotation, especially in the houses you like. During rotation, you’ll have dinner at every house and they’ll all have receptions afterwards. If you realize early on during the reception that you wouldn’t fit into the house, try going to another that you’re curious about and haven’t been too, or one that you’ve been too and liked. And don’t fixate on one house. You have to have to rate 5 houses and you should really love about three of them.</p>
<p>during rotation, ur allowed to skip the reception of a house you don’t like and go to another house’s reception for more than one night?</p>
<p>Yep. Just pick up your name tag at the house you’re supposed to have dinner at, but you can go wherever you want.</p>
<p>One more piece of advice: Give every House a thorough look. Visit all the different Houses during the first few weeks, and make sure you stay around for at least half an hour at dinner. </p>
<p>Some students end up switching Houses because they simply didn’t examine them in enough detail. They find out later that a House they hardly thought about would have been the best fit for them. </p>
<p>This is unfortunate, since it’s an avoidable problem, and becoming a full member of a second House takes a lot of time and energy. (As it should)</p>
<p>So nocloud’s question is about skipping receptions, but Ben Golub’s response is about skipping the entire Rotation event.</p>
<p>To expand: Don’t do what Ben Golub says. You should give each house a fair chance – I’d say going to dinner is an absolute minimum. You can duck out early into the after-dinner reception if you really want to. But if you skip dinner at one house because you think you already know which house you should be in (which you probably don’t), this could easily be seen as a Rotation rules violation on your part. In this case, you might lose your right to submit house ratings at all.</p>
<p>I don’t mean this to apply to nocloud (who after all just asked a valid question), but if you’re the kind of person who thinks “I’ll just pick up my nametag so they’ll /think/ I’m playing fair”, we don’t want you at Caltech. Please go somewhere else.</p>
<p>Also, this is Keegan McAllister, not Ilya, who really needs to learn to log out of public computers.</p>
<p>Sanctimonious prattling (see above) aside, pick up your nametag and leave any house you don’t want to spend time at. You’re not required to spend time in an environment you don’t enjoy, and if you can decide quickly that you don’t enjoy it, there’s no sense in wasting your time.</p>
<p>I wish I’d known this, and so do a lot of other people I’ve talked to. Some houses just plain don’t treat people with respect, and it’s complete nonsense to suggest that anybody should be forced or even cajoled into playing along with this stupid game.</p>
<p>It is not a bad idea to stay for at least 10 minutes of every reception, especially if you have an idea of which house you want to be in. Besides getting to know houses, rotation also has the side effect of getting to know people. It’s nice getting to know prefrosh and upperclassmen from other houses, and seriously, you won’t look back on the 6 nights you spent at other houses as wastes of time. If you’re not enjoying the reception, there’s probably another prefrosh sharing your misery. Go talk to it and make a friend. </p>
<p>What I’m trying to say in the above paragraph is that if you’re not spending your evening trying to get to know the house you’re visiting, you should at the very least try to be socially productive. That being said, towards the end of the week you will have heard about every house’s reception and been to half of them. At that point, I think it’s acceptable to spend very little time at a particular house. Even so, try to keep meeting people. It’s easiest to meet people at the beginning of the year before people get set in their groups of friends. This is a valuable time for prefrosh, and you should use it wisely. </p>
<p>It is in your best interest to keep an open mind during rotation. There are 8 houses, and you will need to rank at least 5 of them. If you already know that you’d like to be in one house, that’s great. You would still do well to check out the other houses, as not everyone gets placed in their first-choice house.</p>
<p>I agree completely that you should maximize meeting people and getting a broad perspective. That’s crucial if you want to have a healthy social life.</p>
<p>I hope nobody takes toooo much offense at what I said above. When I was a prefrosh, I foolishly thought that you should definitely spend time at every house no matter what. But this isn’t so. Use your judgment and realize the point is to find several places you’re comfortable with.</p>
<p>The more I consider Ben’s perspective, the more I find myself agreeing with it. There are definitely cases where, after some personal experience, one is certain that a specific House isn’t for them. In that case, one should be under no obligation to visit there for Rotation. </p>
<p>Regardless, make sure you get some dinner before you decide to skip a House’s reception. There’s nowhere else to eat on campus in the evening.</p>
<p>Thanks, GracieLegend. One more thing I realized. Keegan’s remark above:
is also nonsense.</p>
<p>Nobody (certainly not I) suggests picking up your nametag and leaving as a method of cheating the rotation process. I checked with the IHC Chair last night, and there is no rule requiring that each frosh spend significant time at each house. There is no responsibility on the part of frosh to bend over backwards to give each house the benefit of the doubt for an extended period of time, especially if you have decided where your preferences lie with respect to that house. You are entitled to make judgments and act based on them. It’s also not the privilege of others (Keegan or anybody else) to decide whether your judgments are legitimate or whether you should be forced to think it over more.</p>
<p>If you pick up your nametag and leave early, you can do that with your head held high. You’re not cheating anyone, but maybe you are sticking it to people who get their kicks by making others feel uncomfortable, which is all the more reason to be proud.</p>
<p>(Personal Views) Ben, while there is no /rule/ requiring that each frosh spend significant time at each house, I personally think the spirit of the rules ask (but not require) that you give each House a fair chance. I feel that PFW is too short a time to really understand a House, and while Rotation is not necessarily long enough, it is a much longer, extra bit of time to learn about how each House fits into the System as a whole and where the differences lie.</p>
<p>Also, is it really to much to ask people to spend an hour or so feeling uncomfortable once in a while? Many people come to Tech in a bubble, and seeing how other people choose to live their lives can be interesting once in a while.</p>
<p>I also think that Keegan’s statement is 100% correct and fairly stated, though from a perspective that not everyone sees the House system from. From the perspective of a highly sheltered former High Schooler, I could definitely see some situations that occur that could make one feel uncomfortable. Rotation is not meant to change everyone or even anyone, college as a whole does that well enough. Keegan’s last point about “we don’t want you here” has a basis in the Honor Code only works when we hold ourselves to it. With a perspective of ‘I want people to /think/ I’m playing fair,’ it’ll be hard to stay here without doing something that will draw the ire of the BoC. All in all, I definitely don’t think it was “sanctimonious prattling.”</p>
<p>Finally, it’s important to note that the Houses are trying really hard to “be themselves” as much as they can during Rotation and PFW, sometimes overly so. Keep in mind that at almost any other time, things are much more sedate at Caltech than during Rotation and PFW.</p>
<p>(Official Views) While Ben’s statement was perfectly acceptable in not putting bias for or against any House, we advise prefrosh to understand that dinner is only one part of a House’s personality. For example, some of the crazier Houses are much more restrained in other parts of life at Tech. </p>
<p>The official position regarding the potential violation of Rotation rules varies by IHC from year to year. However, tactfully done, Ben’s suggestion would be valid by the rules. It is not encouraged, though.</p>
<p>We do suggest that you give each House a chance, since first impressions aren’t always correct. Furthermore, the system is designed to be accomodating. We understand that if you’re not comfortable in a House, then there’s a 99% chance you will not end up in that House. You don’t lose anything from attending a dinner/reception at a place you’re not interested in living in.</p>
<p>My final official recommendation is that when and if one decides not to attend a dinner, one should talk to the President of the House in question. The President has volunteered to be the head of the House, and as such will do his or her best to explain the House’s personality in ways that are unfairly biased towards other Houses. </p>
<p>The key in “bias” as mentioned in Rotation rules is that there is the possibility of people using their experience at Caltech to be believable in giving untrue, biased information about certain Houses. This is what Rotation rules hope to prevent. In almost all circumstances, Presidents can be trusted to follow the guidelines of these rules to help you make a smart, proper decision.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Yes, you do lose something quite important. Time and energy you could have been using to get to know people and enjoying yourself instead of feeling odd at some event you don’t enjoy.</p>
<p>To be fair about it, you also lose something by leaving: the opportunity to change your mind about a house you may have misjudged. But all of us do that when making any decision, and it’s not my place, Craig’s place, or anyone else’s to lord it over others and say “you must think for at least n minutes before you’re allowed to make this important decision.” You’re all grown-ups, not idiots, and maybe you can decide how long is long enough.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>The comment only makes any sense if we accept that there’s something unfair or dishonorable about leaving a reception/dinner early. I would not advise anyone to do anything to create the perception of playing fair when he or she isn’t. This isn’t about that. It’s not unfair or dishonest to leave if you’re 100% sure about your decision. (This accusation of Keegan’s, btw, is the part that was sanctimonious prattling.)</p>