Residential Life and Housing Services released spring semester housing assignments last Wednesday, with about 100 roommate pairs receiving assignments on campus and 24 pairs opting for off-campus housing, officials confirmed Monday.
For approximately 60 students, however, assignments are still up in the air, said Marijean Williams, director of housing assignments and communications.
Williams said all students requesting on-campus housing would be found assignments by the end of December, but students' preferences may not be accommodated.
She said the delay in deciding the assignments came largely as a result of current on-campus students who were finalizing their spring housing plans.
"I could wait [for an assignment] until the very end of December when there may be a slightly better chance of living with my preferred roommate, but there is no guarantee of either roommate or location," junior Elissa Lerner said in an online correspondence from Copenhagen, Denmark.
Of the 60 students without assignments, less than half have preferred roommates, Williams added. From that pool of students, RLHS intends to accommodate at least some of the preferred roommate pairs.
In addition to the 24 newly determined off-campus pairs, more than 170 students were also given permission to live off campus earlier this month.
Originally, RLHS announced that of the 117 roommate pairs requesting on-campus housing, only 75 would be accommodated, leaving the remaining 42 to find off-campus housing or be split up on campus.
Williams said the number of accommodated roommate pairs rose to 100 because it included students who requested a roommate who was already living on campus.
For the group of students who received an assignment on West Campus, the Nov. 22 announcements were a relief.
"I was very surprised," junior Laura Dickey, who received a room on main West, said in an online correspondence from Paris. "I was expecting the worst."
But students who remained in housing limbo said they were frustrated by their continued lack of assignment.
Many students said their biggest worry with the system was the prospect of being assigned a random roommate they did not know.
"I didn't want to be assigned in a room with a 'rando,' so I registered for a vacancy in a double with a girl I knew would be a compatible roommate," junior Anne Knox Morton said in an online correspondence from Paris.
Junior Katie Lee, who had planned to be in a triple with Lerner before RLHS informed her that a triple would not be available, said she would have preferred that RLHS had given more detailed information about housing availability.
"I split off and became a single person seeking a random roommate, and I still don't have housing," Lee said in an online correspondence from Madrid, Spain. "I just can't believe that nothing out of my 10 [preferred] choices is available."
Although students said they would have preferred to have more information about housing availability earlier in the process, many said they did not know how RLHS could have prevented the problem.
"I think the process is nerve-wracking no matter what, but this year it was particularly so, given the housing shortage," Dickey said.
"I think that's a big problem, but I'm not sure RLHS could have done anything differently except perhaps warn people earlier so they could look for other options," Dickey added.
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