Any Ivies w decent dorms

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My freshman is living in a tiny basement room with a roommate, next to the laundry, farthest from the restrooms, with trains choo choo-ing till midnight a block away, flooded in the first month, and WITHOUT A/C. Nevertheless, they are happy there so I don’t have any complaints.

Where is this? You sure you aren’t confusing your kid’s dorm with the movie My Cousin Vinny? Does the train come through every night at 4am?

No, it’s where the Blues brothers lived.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I hear people asking about schools with really nice dorms I think of some mid-tier state school where they have tiered levels of dorms and allow some students to pay more than other students for newer, nicer dorms.

That's not how the Ivies roll.

Right, if any organizations abhor treating the wealthy better than others, it’s the Ivies. That’s why you have to try real hard to find any well-off students at Ivies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Trinity University, best dorms

I assume you're talking about Winn, Witt, and Myrtle here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
My memories of Yale are totally defined by the shabby, dark and irregular quality of the housing. They've renovated a lot but it's still not great, especially because everyone pays the same amount but the luck of the housing lottery or willingness to submit fake doctor notes can make the difference between a stunning suite or a dumpy rathole.

Although residential colleges and dorm rooms were supposedly selected mostly randomly and only to balance things by geography, gender and interests, that was not the case. Inevitably the most well-off or connected students ended up in the most spacious, historically special or appealing 1st year suites. I understand that Harvard did things quite similarly. Not sure if others are more evolved.

What kind of doctors note gets you a nicer dorm?

My friends who got "medical singles" did not have actual medical problems but were savvy and had their primary care physicians cite anxiety, ADHD, sleep apnea, and insomnia (different friends, not all the same diagnoses for one person) starting sophomore year. I remember one person who had celiac disease and tried to get one but they were denied. There were always 2-3 single rooms reserved for this purpose, and I think some people took what we then called "annex" housing in nearby apartment buildings if there weren't sufficient medical singles but their request was accepted.

The only person I knew with a legit medical single had what was then referred to as HFA and that was from day 1 freshman year, and was definitely legit. He would have been non-functioning in a shared space.

Kids used to use diet restrictions to get the suites with kitchens and then pull in all their friends. The restrictions often (not always of course) went with wealth and privilege. The university started offering a lot more diet restricted options in the halls to curtail this.

Other than that, I don't see the wealthy having first dibs over the lottery system. I do notice that some apply for an on campus room, then also get an off campus apartment as well. Oh, to be rich!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You consider the Harvard houses not nice?

I liked the Harvard dorms just fine when I attended, and they've mostly been renovated since. I experienced historic and charming and newer and more comfortable. Both were great, but too bad the fireplaces were closed up (and the indoor swimming pool in Adams).

I had no a/c in the law schoolffor three years - it made for miserable Septembers and Mays

[Anonymous]

At Yale, Old Campus (where most first years live) and 12 out of the 14 residential colleges do not have AC. Some of the dorms with hall bathrooms don't even have bathrooms on every floor. I know some who had to go up or down stairs to get to a bathroom. The 2 new residential colleges are far from the others -- you have to walk past the cemetary as it is up by science hill.

Princeton has been building new dorms lately and by 2026 when Hobson College is complete, I think about 2/3 (maybe more) of their dorms will have AC (Rocky, Mathey and Forbes? don't have AC)

Harvard is known to have a lot of mice, rodent and maintenance issues. They have no plans to renovate Harvard Yard dorms.

Brown's dorms (except the few new ones) are bad. Dartmouth too.

Not sure about Penn, Columbia and Cornell...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You consider the Harvard houses not nice?

mine had no A/C and heat went on late!

[Anonymous]

Columbia was decent to nice…back in the ‘90s.