Campus Council members listened to a presentation about housing for juniors returning from study abroad at the Council's general body meeting Thursday night.
Jen Frank, program coordinator for Residential Life and Housing Services, said that because four to five times more students study abroad in the fall semester than in the spring, it is always more difficult to accommodate students who wish to live on campus when they return in the spring.
"It's usually the other way around on other campuses-we think it's a basketball effect," she said.
Frank said students going abroad in the fall should be aware that they forfeit their ability to control their housing situation because all spaces remaining on campus are those considered "undesirable."
Juniors who have lived on campus for five semesters, including those who spent a semester abroad, are eligible to participate in an off-campus lottery, which may release them from their six-semester on-campus housing requirement.
The number of juniors released depends on the number of beds available on campus, as all spaces must be filled before students can be released, Frank said.
Facilities and Services Chair Hasnain Zaidi, a junior, asked why RLHS cannot hold separate lotteries to allow at least some students to know their spring housing situations earlier in the semester, when RLHS makes a conservative estimate of the number of students who will not be able to be housed on campus.
Under the current policy, juniors participating in the lottery do not find out whether they may live off campus until early November.
"From previous feedback we found that people would be more angry if they find out later than others," Frank said. "It would be more fair for all to find out together."
She added that the current notification time does not make it more difficult for students to find off-campus housing because many students already have apartments tentatively selected and are only waiting to sign the lease.
Because available bed space is affected by a number of factors that RLHS cannot control-such as how many students go abroad in the spring-the number of juniors allowed to be released cannot be determined earlier, Frank said.
This year a second round of the off-campus housing lottery was offered last Friday to juniors currently abroad because of a lack of space to accommodate preferred roommate pairs next semester.
A total of 117 preferred roommate pairs requested on-campus housing, but only 75 pairs can be housed.
Twenty-four pairs were chosen to live off campus, and those wishing to live on campus may be split into single rooms if double rooms cannot be found.
"We felt that it was better to let them choose to live together but off campus or to stay on campus but maybe separated," Frank said.
Campus Council President Jay Ganatra, a senior, proposed to consolidate current doubles only occupied by one resident to create more spaces for returning juniors.
"Theoretically we can do that," Frank said. "But we're probably not going to because it won't be well received by students."
She added it would not be fair to those residents if RLHS just volunteered them to accommodate a random roommate.
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