Kelsey Mix – Copy Editor – @glitSz
If you’ve ever had the pleasure of living on campus at Southern, you have most likely had to endure what I did this past Sunday: the room selection process. Residence Life at Southern seems to make this procedure the most vague and difficult it could possibly be. The emails—or should I say novels—flood your inbox a little before spring break and the anxiety kicks in. Where am I going to live? Who am I going to live with? Do I need a meal plan? Which building is the cheapest?
And the turmoil doesn’t stop there.
After getting the form from your hall director, you then find out where you’re eligible to live the following year. One of my current roommates ran into an issue with having the correct number of credits to move into North Campus. Since she took the Math 95 course her freshman year (that doesn’t count towards your overall credits), she was three credits short and wasn’t able to move into North with me. This leads back to the flaws of the new liberal education program, but we won’t get into that.
Now you have to contemplate who you want to live with next year.
This could be a pretty grueling process for some.
If you’ve found someone you enjoy spending time with and can live with, good for you!
Otherwise, find friends of friends you know and start brainstorming because if you don’t have a group of people that fills a room, you’ll have to go to room selection at five o’clock rather than two. Not to mention you’ll have random roommates too.
But there’s always a silver lining for some.
If you want to live in your current residence hall and just live with people that live in the same building, you can skip all of this! Not all of us have that luxury, though.
If you have a full two, four or six people (depending on which residence hall you’re living in), you’re now eligible to go to room selection. Wonderful. For those of you who haven’t had to go through this, you sit outside the student center for an hour or more and wait for the Residence Hall Association staff to let you in. If you’ve been there, you know the agony you have to undergo when a staff member goes inside while you have to freeze or burn up outside of Dunkin.
It just so happened that last year I got sunburned because of how hot it was, but this year I was wrapped up in a blanket.
Once you’re finally let in, you get to walk all the way up to the ballroom and stop at a few tables in the process to make sure you’re qualified to live in the dorm you selected.
The two girls in front of me on Sunday were turned away because there apparently weren’t any doubles left in Schwartz, so they technically didn’t have a full room anymore and they had to come back at five. Important side note: make sure you’re as prepared as possible when you come to room selection. Have a back up plan because you never know what could be thrown at you that afternoon.
Something most new people don’t realize is that once you get into the ballroom, it’s basically a raffle. You are given a number and you need to wait until a staff member calls your number; after which, you wait in yet another line to select a room.
The one thing I do like about this process is that they provide food and a movie while you wait for your number to be called. Once you speak to the residence hall director, you’re all set for housing next semester!
The question I’m still toying with is: is this the most effective way to do this? My guess is no.
My friend that attends a school in New Jersey signs up for housing through email and the school’s website, which I think could be so much easier for everyone involved. All of the students and staff could be spared a crazy day in the student center ballroom if we just tweaked the process even a bit.
I think it might even be easier if we signed up for housing at each separate residence hall that we all want to live in the following year.
I guess since I am not on the residence hall staff, I don’t quite know what does and doesn’t work for them, but I can say that they are not making it any easier for students either.
