<p>you are upset and are lumping together a bunch of issues. if the merit scholarship letters said they could be used for study abroad and that is now being changed – i don’t blame affected students being really upset about it.</p>
<p>but the housing thing – to presume that brandeis would just keep renovating dorms so that there’d be space for midyears just isn’t fair. if anything brandeis students should be glad that a lot of the other planned construction is going forward. in fact i’m pretty sure they’ve known for a while that there wouldn’t be another dorm renovated in fall 2009 creating the “where do we house '10 midyears” issue. they’ve just completed the complete rebuilding of the ridgewood dorms which will have a net increase in the number of rooms on campus and make on campus housing easier to obtain for upper class students. so they’ve come up with this plan that solves the midyear issue and minimizes the number of empty rooms when people study abroad – quite honestly – both of which are legitimate concerns for a college. you really weaken your argument about the study abroad policy changes by painting the housing change as part of some plot to squeeze money out of study abroad students. </p>
<p>you’re upset - -but focus on the real issue.</p>