^ That is not funny but it is the reality. 
Absolutely a culture of secrecy, and hereâs another example: Michigan proudly announces that it will not know its 2015-2016 tuition until its trustees decide on it in June 2015. Of course students must commit by May 2015. Does Michigan not see the absurdity in having students commit before even knowing the tuition, or do they just not care? From what Iâve seen thus far in terms of their concern for helping students and families through the freshman entry process, my vote is for their just not caring.
I am not sure about the âsecrecyâ since billcsho pointed out the move in days have been on the calendar all along, although admittedly not that easy to find. I found the whole move in situation to be extremely well organized last year. Some of you posters probably are just not going to like Michigan because of the way you have started out with so many complaints. Too bad because it is a fabulous school.
Just as an aside, NYU law school, where my other son has applied, says on its website that decisions may not be rendered until the end of April even though they acknowledge that deposits at other law schools are due in early to mid-April. So all schools have their issues. Oh well, my son is most likely going to go to Michigan law school (where he has be admitted) anyway.
Everyone expect the tuition to go up slightly each year while the rate is set in early summer. It is not a secret, just the way it is.
I donât know how long Michigan has been inefficient at this housing process, but there is one thing that I donât see taken into account so far in this thread: Michigan has spent the better part of the last 10 years doing deep renovations of many of the dorms. This process is ongoing with Cambridge house and another building (memory doesnât serve in this case) on the docket. The good news is that they have spent buckets of cash and the results have been roundly applauded. The bad news may be that the planning process for those renovations may have confused the supply of rooms a bit as buildings go off line and then come back on line. Apparently, other schools are better at this than Michigan, so that may be a correlative â albeit weak â excuse.
My experience as a graduate student was that the process was very streamlined many years ago. Michigan in general seems a bit more slanted toward the graduate teaching and research experience, and the housing may benefit from that fact.
The undergraduate division may not be as well administered, but Michigan in general is very well administered from many different angles (in fact rated #1 or #2 for teaching higher education administration; fastest growing endowment and research budgets over the last 10 years, improving rankings, improving student metrics, improving post-graduation outcomes) and is the de facto farm team for many elite institutions as well as many mid-range schools.
I think the folks on this board should press Michigan hard about these shortfallsâŠthe institution does a fair amount of navel gazing in the spirit of self improvement and Iâd bet a few complaints might actually yield results.
As another poster noted, the probability is high that any given random attendee is going to love the place â note the very high freshman retention rate (around 97% as I recollect) â so it is worth going through a few teething pains to settle in.
In case people here are not aware of that, the over enrollment of freshmen last year led to a shortage of ~300 dorm space. They have to convince the upperclassmen to release some dorm space by offering them free upgrade to higher quality apartments. They probably donât want to put something too solid so far ahead of time in case they ran into trouble like that.
My son got to choose his move in day and time when he signed up for housing and submitted his deposit. There were lots of kids who moved in after the official dates.
Update:
According to the UMICH booklet (Spring 2015 edition) I got yesterday, the move in day for this year is 9/4-5
I donât know whether this applies to ALL grades or just freshmen.
Just freshmen. My S will be a sophomore and his housing contract from next year says it begins on September 6. Generally the freshmen move in first because there are special activities for them.
@2135arâ Thanks for the verification.
@viphan I have already posted the move-in date on #14. Return students may move in even earlier if they are going to help the freshmen moving in.
@billcshoâ Thanks for the update.