About a third of the 111 juniors who applied for off-campus housing this Fall will be able to live off campus in the Spring.
Thirty-eight juniors were granted exemptions from their three-year residency requirement, Housing, Dining and Residence Life announced Monday. This wave of applications followed a round of exemptions granted in April, when 60 of 140 juniors were released from their housing contracts. Fewer juniors were released from their housing contracts this year when compared to 2010, when 165 students were granted exemptions. This is partly due to the opening of Keohane 4E Quadrangle this Spring, which will add 150 beds to West Campus and whose brand new facilities are in part acting as an incentive for students to remain on campus.
“I know that a number of students that I spoke with that were going to be abroad had very high interest in living in K4 when they returned,” said Joe Gonzalez, associate dean of residence life.
Many students share this sentiment. Junior Abby Mathieson, who is currently studying abroad, was granted off-campus housing in this second wave but said that given her preference she would have chosen differently.
“To be honest, if I could have been guaranteed a room in K4, that would have been my first choice,” Mathieson wrote in an email Tuesday. “If there was more housing on [West] or better housing on [Central Campus] more juniors would opt to live on campus.”
Juniors who are interested in living off campus in their second semester are entered into a lottery and selected randomly. This was the first year that HDRL administered an off-campus housing lottery in the Spring.
“In previous years, we did not run a pre-lottery in April,” said Linda Moiseenko, manager for Duke community housing. “The pre-lottery likely reduced the number of applicants for the Fall lottery.”
Some juniors said not being guaranteed housing on West drives them to apply for housing exemptions.
“I was worried that I would get stuck on Central Campus,” junior Diana Bramson, who is currently abroad, said. “I didn’t want to take the risk so I decided to apply for off-campus housing. My roommate and I are really glad that we’ll be able to live off campus next year.”
Another reason why many juniors apply for off-campus housing, Mathieson said, is not that students want to be off campus but rather they believe some amenities of Central and West to be inadequate.
“I applied for off-campus housing because I wanted to live in an apartment with my own kitchen and bathroom,” she said. “I was attracted to the idea of my own space away from the stress of campus.”
Junior Stephan Lambert said that living off campus might be fun, but it never appealed to him.
“I would much rather be on campus where it is easier to get to class, easier to get food and easier to go to the school’s activities,” Lambert wrote in an email Tuesday.
He noted that K4 did not influence his decision to stay on campus.
Specifics about which students will be living in K4 next semester are still uncertain, Moiseenko said. Housing assignments will not begin to be processed until after the Oct. 31 deadline.
It is fairly certain that the residents of K4 next semester will be many juniors returning from abroad as well as a handful of students currently on campus, Gonzalez said.
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