<p>Well, I must admit it.
I placed one of those mom calls to the housing office at the big state U.
Didn’t mention my kid’s name…just asked a few questions about the housing draw, lottery numbers, etc.
The wonderful woman insisted that my son should call her and she’d set him straight on how it works. I was sure son would never place such a call.
Two days later, son emails me that ‘Jane’ in the housing office helped him locate other roommates for a quad the next year.
‘Crisis’ over. So happy that Jane works in this large, supposedly impersonal U.</p>
<p>I lack the sage wisdom of all of you fine parents, but going into my freshman year this year, I had some housing issues…</p>
<p>My roomie and I requested each other and sub-free early in the summer. We didn’t get sub-free. I freaked and called Res. Life ASAP. They told me roommate requests are honored before all else. My roomie had turned in her housing forms later than I did, and because they fill housing for freshman according to when your forms were recieved, we didn’t get sub-free for that reason. But we were living together and both of us are extremely anti smoking/drinking/drugs, so there have been no problems within the room. We have however faced some issues with noisy partiers in nearby rooms, and have complained. Sending an angry e-mail to the head of residence life at 1am does wonders for your noise issues, lol :). </p>
<p>We are not living together next year because she’s rooming with a track teammate and I’m hoping for a single, but things went okay even though we didn’t get sub-free. Is it possible that the friend could pull put of the sub-free lottery and go to the regular lottery with your D? If they were really excited about living together then I bet this girl would seriously consider it. </p>
<p>And yes, rising sophs are lowest on the housing totem poll. I have been randomly assigned a lottery number for the various lotteries next week. I’ll be picking a room based on class standing now(freshman) and lottery number. Apparently, my 150 is good; I know of a fellow freshman girl down the hall who’s number is 320. Obviously, the lower your number, the sooner you’ll be given a room. If I don’t get my single, I’ll be over in sub-free with friends I know. I don’t actually think my chances of getting a single are too terrible because many upperclassmen go to the on-campus apartments or they chose to move off campus completely. Here, the majority of students living in dorms are freshmen. </p>
<p>Whichever parent said that the various campus offices hate to get calls from parents is right. If I were to not get a single, the situation would probably not improve at all from my mom calling Res. Life. There are only so many single rooms, and only so many that will be available at the lottery because those with singles right now get first choice of keeping their single; some(I’m unsure of even a general percentage or anything) chose to do that. </p>
<p>There’s probably some possibility that a room in sub-free could become available to your D later in the semester or over the summer, but it’s not something she should count on if the issue can’t be resolved in the coming days. She should make some kind of arrangemet to live with someone else. Good luck to her :).</p>
<p>If it makes you feel any better, my d. is on the “waitlist” for housing at her college and will not know until August, having been burned on 2 lottery go-rounds. She had wisely chosen to join a group of 5 after ascertaining that there were more 5-person suites than any other combo – but all such suites were gone before their lottery number came up – and all singles were gone by the time my d’s turn came up in the regular draw. So as a rising soph she is in worse shape than she was as an entering freshman, where she had befriended another entering via myspace & their request to be roomed together was honored. Not only that, my d had a fair-to-middling lottery number for a current freshman… it looks like the sophs & juniors just got all the good spots. Off-campus living is not an option, either – my d. would love to live off-campus, but her financial aid would be cut by $10K if she opted for anything other than on-campus housing – so she’ll just have to wait and see.</p>
<p>She was quite distraught and angry on the lottery days – and I still think that the way her school manages the whole thing defies any sense of logic. However, I haven’t heard a word about the issue since that time – she is focusing on her classes and her plans for a summer internship, and there’s not much we can do in any case. Worst case scenario is that she gets a bad housing situation in the fall and needs to put in for a room change in the spring. </p>
<p>Way back when, my son had great luck with his draw as a rising sophomore, getting one of the last available singles in a very good suite – but a year later there was an absolute fiasco and, as a rising junior, he also was consigned to a waitlist. In his case, it was the final straw on top of some academic problems that led to his decision not to return to college the following year.</p>
<p>For $7,000 or $9,000 a year I would feel no qualms at all about calling the housing office.</p>
<p>On the other hand, I would never intervene in academic issues.</p>
<p>to orangepurple, I agree with the majority and would let your daughter handle it as best she can. If I were in your shoes I would just make sure that the college is following their own policy. If they made a mistake, then they should correct it. I also agree with another poster about how things change over the summer. Perhaps there’s a waiting list for the dorm she wants?</p>
<p>Notre dame AL - At many colleges freshman get freshman-only dorms so they are not competing with the rest of the students for dorms. That’s why rising soph’s are considered low men on the totem pole. </p>
<p>At my son’s school they have something called squatters rights where if you like your room you can just stay there. My son and a group of 11 other students got a 1/2 a hall for an outdoor activity themed group with private rooms and I’m wondering if they can “squat” in it until they graduate. His college encourages dorm living for all four years.</p>
<p>DS is also dealingwith housing stuff. Just did his soph class registration and sailed through. Last semester when he had problems he made friends with the advisors in his honors department. They assisted him in a heartbeat. I like the poster who talked about “Jane” in housing. Our experience has been that when the student (not the parent) takes the initiative the housing and academic staff at the school have been happy to assist. Yesterday, DS was telling me gleefully on IM, “those ladies love me”.<br>
He was very proud of his ability to work with them and get them to both like and assist him. OP: let your daughter give it a try before you step in.</p>
<p>thanks for posting this thread-
My oldest at an LAC had a single room in subfree housing for three years- then a nice townhouse in off campus but college owned housing for senior year.
The “theme” dorms, like subfree, went first- if you didn’t want a theme dorm, you only were in one pool, but if you did want a theme dorm, you had that choice and then if you didn’t get it ( unusual) then you would be in reg pool.</p>
<p>I anticipated housing at big universities, that we may consider for my younger D, to be an issue, but I didn’t realize it was so difficult even at much smaller schools
Thanks for the heads up
I also agree with the student building their confidence by dealing with it themselves- you can be a good listener though :)</p>
<p>Right up to last night, I was in the camp of let the kid deal with the housing problem;don’t get involved. I’m not there anymore. </p>
<p>First, my S was with a group of six planning to seek a large suite. Sometime in Feb, that dissolved and there was left a group of four planning to seek a suite. By the middle of March, two of the four learned they were being required to live in the frat house they had recently pledged. So, my S and the other kid tried for awhile to put together another group, but most people they knew were already committed. Now, S’s first mistake was not simply to join in the roommate mix with totally new people or ask Res Life to help him figure out what to do. Instead, S and the fourth guy in the quad-that-was-not-meant-to-be each agreed to take up the offer of a couple upperclassmen who were looking for roommates for off-campus apartments very close to campus. S was disappointed not to be living on campus with a group of friends, but he had moved on and dealt with it himself and was looking forward to the new arrangement. The upperclassman who was holding the apt told him what his rent would be and when it was due; my S told him he was in, he’d take it. S thought housing was settled so he did not put in an on-campus housing assignment application by the April 4 deadline. (Second big mistake). Wouldn’t you know, on April 5, this upperclassman emails him to say that a friend suddenly surfaced who wants to room with him and sorry, the apt is no longer available.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, deadlines are deadlines and my S is pretty much out of luck for on-campus housing. There’s something called the Administrative Round when, if there’s a spot, he might get one, but frankly, he didn’t get the impression there was much hope and he might not know until the summer. Not helpful. If they can’t place him on campus, they’ll find some spot in some off-campus apt which may or may not be anywhere close to the main campus. </p>
<p>I realize this problem is of his own making, not being prescient enough to put in his application before the deadline even though he thought he was set. I feel bad for him because he said he didn’t want to let the other guy down after he’d told him he’d take the room so he didn’t try to hold a spot in Res Life. Then the kid waits two days, a day past the housing deadline, to tell my S he’s out of luck. It bothers me that the system is basically to let kids fend for themselves and if they’re lucky, their roommate group holds together and all is well. And if they’re not, and they miss a deadline by a day, they’re persona non grata with no place to live. </p>
<p>So I feel in a real dilemma as a parent. We can let him solve the problem himself, which means the stressful waiting until who knows when to find out where he’s living and with whom. Or we can step in, try to find an apartment to rent near campus that is not university owned, but at least we have a say in where it is and how close it is to the college. And he can put out a notice for roommates and make a choice instead of being stuck with wherever they put him. “Hands off, let the kid handle it” is not where I am right now.</p>
<p>Whew. Obviously needed to vent.</p>
<p>jazzymom- what an unfortunate set of events! :(</p>
<p>I’d make sure my kid got on the Administrative Round list, and have him enlist the help of the Residential Advisor, Dean of Students, and anyone else he can round up to advocate for him. If they haven’t actually assigned the rooms yet for the totally new people and those without pre-picked roomates, it really shouldn’t be too late to get into the draw. I know, they had a deadline, but this is an expensive private school, right? I can’t believe an exception wouldn’t be made for a freshman student from out-of-state to at least be on the list for random housing for transfer students. He needs to find a sympathetic ear at the university, immediately. I wouldn’t think of helping him look for off-campus apartments until he has exhausted all on-campus options. There has to be someone in charge of housing that can make this happen. He needs to find that person, and make his case.</p>
<p>Jazzymom…
Let’s go out for a drink and you can vent more!</p>
<p>You’re both probably too far away for me to join you, so: CHEERS!</p>
<p>jazzymom, it is all a matter of perspective. Many schools have dorm space sufficient for only a fraction of the students. That means kids are looking for roommates, finding apartments, dealing with leases and utilities. Mine has stumbled through all of that and, of course, now we are paying for an apartment that she will not need until next Fall. Before then she will need to put up window coverings, shower curtains, etc and look out for deals on cheap or discarded furniture and household necessities. Then she and her roommates will have to deal with cooperation on cleaning, cooking and sharing a very limited amount of space. If it doesn’t work out well, the whole process will be repeated again next year. She is handling it all, except of course for the money and cosigning the lease.</p>
<p>ASAP:</p>
<p>Thanks for the sympathetic ear. I’ll suggest to him that he talk to advisors and see if there is anything else that he can do. I called him today and he had just gone into Res Life to register for the administrative round. (The deadline he had missed was to be guaranteed on-campus housing in the regular selection round.) He was told that rather than being guaranteed, on-campus housing for him will be space available and according to lottery number. His is a middle one, not as high as a junior’s or senior’s who wants to be on campus. Then again, they usually don’t want to be where the sophs are so maybe there’s hope that a space will be available. </p>
<p>It just is so frustrating to me because I had talked to him about not being hung up on knowing his future roommates and just putting his name in the hat to be assigned by Res Life under the regular selection round (we spoke the day before the deadline). But as I said, he felt that he’d already given a verbal committment to the student looking for an apt roommate and he’d already “moved on” and decided that he’d go with that housing option instead of rooming with totally new faces under the Res Life system. He was totally gobsmacked that this upperclassman strung him along and then hung him out to dry. A tough life lesson not to trust people I guess. </p>
<p>S may have to resign himself to a year of inconvenient off-campus housing and then try again next year when he’ll have a higher lottery number for a better housing assignment. As I understand it, he is in a better position than the transfer students will be, since some of them don’t know they are coming until much later. It’s just hard to see him go through the stress of not knowing where he’ll be living, particularly as pretty much all the friends he’s made seem to be set, either in quads or frat houses or in the case of the other kid he was teamed with, an off-campus apt offer that hasn’t been rescinded with the worst possible timing. Yes, it is an expensive private school. Don’t get me started on that particular sore point.</p>
<p>Blu: You’re on. Name a time.</p>
<p>Anyone else find this substance-free dorm thing odd? If students are under 21 aren’t they all (officially) substance-free? Or are there bars-and-bongs sanctioned dorms? C’mon, having a substance-free form is like having cheat-free exams, date-rape-free parties, and steroid-free sports.</p>
<p>I’ll do what post #21 did. As an adult, we are in a better position to get message across without being offensive. Bad dormitory situation may have severe consequence. I’ll rather be proactive on this.</p>
<p>To be brief, I agree.</p>
<p>I don’t believe it will cause a character fault in the kid to get some assistance. But i really know i am going against CC received wisdom when I say this.</p>
<p>You know, Garland, I think it’s all a matter of degree.</p>
<p>Natural consequences vs. lessons learned.</p>
<p>None of us would have let out kids learn to not run into the street by watching them get hit by a car. (Geez, I hope that’s a true statement.)</p>
<p>Most of us WOULD let our kids learn to, say, not procrastinate, by watching them wait too long to start a paper and than get a lower grade than they otherwise would have received.</p>
<p>It’s the stuff in between that gets tricky. I think I’m with you on this one.</p>
<p>I also agree with what you’re saying. In bureaucracy world, though, often what happens to them is not their fault. Any assistance to fix some of the snafus (like the OP’s) seems okay to me if it can help.</p>
<p>And, at least for my kids, we did the logical consequences thing already. They get it. As far as the real world and its frustrations, in my mind, dealing with it is a group effort.</p>
<p>That doesn’t mean i’m going to get my kid a better housing number than he ended up with, that’s a big oh well; he’ll be the senior with the worst room!</p>
<p>There’s unhappy, there’s miserable and there’s suicidal. Unhappy we all have to live with sometimes. Miserable needs every kind of intervention so it doesn’t become suicidal. That’s all I’m talking about. Don’t let it get there. Teenagers are sensitive and impulsive. They still need some hovering sometimes.</p>
<p>Well said, garland.</p>
<p>Our family has the ‘we’re all in this together’ mentality.
If I can point my son in the right direction with a housing issue, he’ll come through with downloading tunes for his sister’s ipod (something way beyond my ability). None of us has all the life skills needed so we borrow each others!</p>