Horrible dorm assignment!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You can’t open a basement window stupid!

Sure you can. I lived in the basement freshman years. Basement rooms are either walkout or, there is a dugout to allow a window. No one is in a windowless room. Also, as many said, basement is cool.

I can see the socialization issue, but a doorstop might help. Also hanging in common spaces. It'll be ok.

[Anonymous]

I lived in a basement dorm. It's not a basement like in your house. It's just the lowest level. They have windows that open and usually a door on the hallway that opens to the outside. It was like any other floor in the dorm just the lowest level. Maybe 1/3 underground.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's why kids who pick schools that have nice dorms, good food, great amenities etc have a much better college experience than kids who pick schools based on the academics.

People laugh at High Point but it is like living in a Four Seasons hotel.

Umm my kids picked their schools for their academic offerings. They certainly weren’t picking based on dorms. One ended up in a crappy one and was fine with it.

How did they pick off of "academic offerings." Most of the things my department offers to students is inaccessible if you don't have a college email and tours do not go through our labs. Applicants hardly know anything about what we offer.

Department web pages, word of mouth, visitation (we toured department spaces) and course catalogs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's why kids who pick schools that have nice dorms, good food, great amenities etc have a much better college experience than kids who pick schools based on the academics.

People laugh at High Point but it is like living in a Four Seasons hotel.

Umm my kids picked their schools for their academic offerings. They certainly weren’t picking based on dorms. One ended up in a crappy one and was fine with it.

How did they pick off of "academic offerings." Most of the things my department offers to students is inaccessible if you don't have a college email and tours do not go through our labs. Applicants hardly know anything about what we offer.

Department web pages, word of mouth, visitation (we toured department spaces) and course catalogs.

I still don't think this gives you even 1/10 of my department offerings, but okay. I'm sure it's different for Non-STEM, but it's very difficult to accurately guess your academic space. I didn't know while signing up that my intro professor has contacts with 3 national labs that essentially auto-hire our students, because he served on a board there, that we have a research team here working for NASA, and that there's a string of student labs that you can join and get paid to research with Seniors as PIs, none of that is on the website, you won't see it on a tour, and it's definitely not in the course catalog.

[Anonymous]

The basement will be much cooler than the floors. Having a single can be awesome for optimal studying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People lived without air conditioning for thousands of years. Your snowflake will survive.

Studies done *on college students* show that sleeping in temperatures that are too warm cause lower math scores on tests. Authors compared math scores from students in dorms with A/C and dorms without.

So this is academically important. A/C is not a frivolous demand these days.

if it is so important to you, then you must pick a college that ONLY has AC in ALL dorms. Otherwise it's a risk you take

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone thing the deans and admin don't have A/C in their office?

Do they spend 9pm until 7 am in their Offices? Many many colleges do not have AC in the dorms. It's impossible or cost prohibitive in many older dorms. The electrical system simply cannot handle it. Also most universities, it is only an issue for a few weeks. Your kid will adjust

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP I am not going to judge because my kid would hate this. I also think if you are super far away then comfort in form means even more. I would reach out to the housing coordinator and ask if something can be done. My guess is there is a student there who wants a single and got a double. I would also see if you have a medical reason that you could get a note on. My DC has allergies and would be miserable in a basement. Anyway worth a try.

I honestly think switching could be worse. Roommates are still people and more often than not, people hate or just end up in really iffy dorm situations from being assigned someone they don't know to live with. I thought I could never be a freshman with a single, two weeks into college, I was sick of my roommate and clawing Housing/Residential Life to get me into a single.

+1

My freshman roommate was nasty, rude and inconsiderate. I would have killed for a single.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People lived without air conditioning for thousands of years. Your snowflake will survive.

Studies done *on college students* show that sleeping in temperatures that are too warm cause lower math scores on tests. Authors compared math scores from students in dorms with A/C and dorms without.

So this is academically important. A/C is not a frivolous demand these days.

I'm so curious about this. Can you cite the study?

Some questions I would have:
1. Who funded the study?
2. Was it peer-reviewed?
3. Did it control for other variables?
4. What was the magnitude of impact on test scores?

DP: I found the study: https://content.tcmediasaffaires.com/LAF/lacom/summer2016.pdf

OK, I read the first paragraph and am already laughing:

We followed 44 students (mean age = 20.2 years; SD = 1.8 years) from a university in the Greater Boston area, Massachusetts in the United States living in AC (n = 24) and non-AC (n = 20) buildings before, during, and after a HW. Two cognition tests were self-administered daily for a period of 12 days (July 9–July 20, 2016), the Stroop color-word test (STROOP) to assess selective attention/processing speed and a 2-digit, visual addition/subtraction test (ADD) to evaluate cognitive speed and working memory. The effect of the HW on cognitive function was evaluated using difference-in-differences (DiD) modelling.

Sample of 44 who tested themselves for 12 days.

I mean, my kid attends a university that doesn't have 8am classes (bonus for everyone). But they instead use 8am as an exam slot (midterms/quizzes/any form of testing) so that any of your larger classes with multiple sections take the exam AT THE SAME TIME---that would be 8am.

For my kid who prefers to go to sleep at 2am+ and not have a class before noon, that definately explained the B/B+ in Calc 3 & 4.

But its what the university does, and for many of your freshman/soph classes you get stuck taking exams/midterms at 8am.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you. My very quiet kid has been assigned to a triple. He had read that his college has a lengthy questionnaire for incoming freshmen to match roommates and assign people to hall sections, including a free response essay about interests and the opportunity to request a single. But when the housing form came out this year, it asked exactly two questions: one about sleeping habits and another about visitors. Then it took until near the end of July for the college to even tell him where he's living. Not sure how random assignments took that long. He's not happy, not excited, and not optimistic. I am starting to regret the horror stories I've told him over the years about my own experience in a freshman year triple. Not good.

Did you agree to pay for a double? I'm curious if colleges honor requests if you ask for double or single and are willing to pay the higher rate.

Many colleges don't have different pay rates. I pay the same for my junior's single studio-like housing with its own kitchen and bathroom as when she was a freshman in a triple dorm that can only be described as a halfway house.

Interesting. DC's school charges much more for a single than for a double/triple.

So does literally every school I've ever visited/investigated (have 3 kids, so that would be 60+ universities, plus all 3 of my kids friends) Never seen school charge same for single as double

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you. My very quiet kid has been assigned to a triple. He had read that his college has a lengthy questionnaire for incoming freshmen to match roommates and assign people to hall sections, including a free response essay about interests and the opportunity to request a single. But when the housing form came out this year, it asked exactly two questions: one about sleeping habits and another about visitors. Then it took until near the end of July for the college to even tell him where he's living. Not sure how random assignments took that long. He's not happy, not excited, and not optimistic. I am starting to regret the horror stories I've told him over the years about my own experience in a freshman year triple. Not good.

Did you agree to pay for a double? I'm curious if colleges honor requests if you ask for double or single and are willing to pay the higher rate.

Many colleges don't have different pay rates. I pay the same for my junior's single studio-like housing with its own kitchen and bathroom as when she was a freshman in a triple dorm that can only be described as a halfway house.

Interesting. DC's school charges much more for a single than for a double/triple.

So does literally every school I've ever visited/investigated (have 3 kids, so that would be 60+ universities, plus all 3 of my kids friends) Never seen school charge same for single as double

Some of the schools in this post alone have a standard charge rate for dorms: Pomona, Stanford, the ivies, most top liberal arts colleges, etc.

[Anonymous]

Is it UCLA? I know that don’t have AC either in all the dorms. It stinks but they’ll get through it, and it will make them stronger.

[Anonymous]

M kid’s 100 year old school only had AC in one dorm.

Your kid won’t need it often in CA (unless they are in the Valley).

[Anonymous]

Yale and Harvard Law didn't have A/c in my dorm rooms. i believe that hasn't vhanged. and we had humidity.

[Anonymous]

So you want to force another kid to have this assignment? Why not your kid?