My daughter has been accepted to UKY and as a national merit semifinalist she will be eligible for the Patterson Scholarship. UKY is a much larger school than she would like, but it is her back-up (financially) if she doesn’t get good enough merit at the LAC’s she applied to.
She received an email about housing this past week, and I vaguely remember a discussion on cc last year saying that you need to apply for housing even before you accept admittance into school in order to get a good dorm. Is this the case? Is it even possible to sign up for housing without accepting admittance? Would a deposit need to be put down? Thank you!
Housing is separate from tuition deposit. You should apply to your top housing choice with a backup. Note even the bottom housing aka a quad is better than most other colleges suites. Assuming your daughter goes make sure she goes to merit weekend.
Thank you! She is interested in honors housing if she gets into the Lewis Honors program… when do students usually find out? It wasn’t mentioned in her acceptance letter.
I seem to recall we put the housing deposit down over Xmas break. Our student attended Merit Weekend in the spring, where she met with an advisor and registered for classes. Afterwards, she officially committed to UK.
Thank you! Anyone know generally when they tell you about honors? I suppose I could wait till Monday to call, but why wait when there’s cc? 
We found out about the scholarships at end of December and honors I believe at end of January. It was nerve racking but he is very happy at Lewis Honors College.
@2manycollegequestions4me DS was recently accepted to UK and we expect he will be a Patterson scholar. After receiving acceptance, he went ahead and completed the housing application. There was an application fee but no deposit to make at this point. He was able to select his top three choices for living learning programs, and he choose honors as his top choice and Stemcats second (would need to be accepted to honors). Also selected his preference on room type (4 person suite with semi private bedroom versus 2 person suite with private bedroom, etc.).
This seems like the right thing to do, going ahead to complete, if you think there is a good possibility your D will attend. You still haven’t committed to attend but you will be a step ahead in the process when she is ready to decide. I don’t know yet when we will be asked to make a housing deposit, but we let you know how it works when we get there.
I think the $50 nonrefundable housing application fee is all you pay until May 1. I read that a $150 housing prepayment is due by May 1. Also read that there is no tuition deposit required at UK. If you find out differently it would be great to know.
DS is about 75% sure he will attend UK, so paying the $50 was a pretty easy call for us.
Thanks LOUKYDAD— We will go ahead and put in the deposit. I called to confirm today and they told me just that… to put Lewis down as first choice even though she’s not in yet (since she does want honors housing) and then make another second choice etc. They also said scholarship info will be out in 2-3 weeks and we should hear about honors by March.
All the deposit for tuition needs to be in AFTER merit weekend(s) which are in March, whichever one you attend (their are 3 pick whatever one is most convenient). I strongly recommend you attend!! Merit weekend is a lot of fun, your child will be tested for foreign language, and math. They will put their schedule together so you need to bring a computer (this is buried in the fine print of the invitation). Most importantly they will meet a lot of their high achieving classmates! They will have the option of getting their ID, I strongly recommend you do this to avoid the VERY long lines during K Week (your child will thank you in August). Yes the lines are longer than the merit weekend ones. They will get talks from the administration and housing on what they are expecting from them…
For parents you will get to sit through presentations from your child’s major college, plus get briefings from financial aid, the campus police (don’t miss this), the health center, transportation, the bookstore, etc…this weekend is not meant for siblings (though they don’t really say this). You also will opportunities to tour the dorms and some of the colleges again. The days are very long wear comfortable shoes, the rooms range from being cool (southerners should think cold bring lots of sweaters) to being hot (yankee’s should be prepared to wear short sleeves). It rained while we were there last year. You also get to sample the local food at the school (which is reasonable).
Note last year our weekend had some state girls basketball game(s) were going on, parking was a nightmare for some parents (don’t be late), I don’t know if this will happen this year or not. The hotels were also taken up in the local area.
Thank you so much gerryfromNE! That is great info—we will definitely attend merit weekend!
There was a fee for Merit Weekend when our kid attended in 2016. I don’t remember the timeline re: housing notification, Honors notification, and Patterson notification. I do remember it was not necessarily in the order one would expect.
I recommend not getting too worked up about housing. It will all work out. Our kid was in Johnson, that year’s Honors housing, and although she liked it well enough, she ended up with a group of friends in another dorm and sort of wished she lived there, with them, instead. This year, she is off-campus.
Merit weekend fee if I recall was $50 per person or something like that I spent more on a rental car. My kid loves the honors housing, he has signed up for it next year. He has a lot of friends from out of state, plus it really helps when you are stuck with a course problem you can find that major in the next room.
We went to merit weekend this year. Was more helpful/useful for my daughter than it was for my wife or me (although we left knowing it was the last one of those parent sessions we would ever need to sit through which itself was a big plus – not a fan of those sessions as a general matter). Sessions with advisers were very helpful. Her advisers had actually looked at her file before meeting with us and it showed. They actually had specific suggestions that applied to her. Advisers have been very good so far. Pre-vet adviser appears to view her job as getting as many UK kids into vet school as she can (novel concept at some places in terms of advising).
My daughter is in honors housing and loves it. Signed up again for next year. She has several friends who live in a nearby dorm but its about the same as walking across the street in terms of distance. Working out very well so far.
We did not do the housing deposit early last year and my son wishes we had. He likes his current dorm but did not get his first choice. If we were doing it again we would put the deposit down early. We were unable to attend merit weekend last year and it still worked out fine with my son getting advisement, the classes he needed, etc.