Juniors face housing crunch
Trumbull College’s junior housing draw was scheduled to take place Monday night, but instead of picking their future suites, Trumbull’s rising juniors spent their evenings wondering if they will have rooms on campus at all.
The unusually high number of rising Trumbull juniors opting to live on campus next year has thrown the college’s housing allocation process into disarray, as Trumbull’s dean and housing committee are struggling to determine where — and if — Trumbull juniors will be able to live on campus.
Looming fears of a housing shortage are not unique to Trumbull....
To #1: but how would Yale the pay for its unionized meal plans?! (And justify its above-market rental rates?)
It would be especially cruel to tell people there's no space for them so late in the off-campus housing game. Most people planning to live off campus have found houses/apartments and made offers already. It doesn't sound like that will really happen, though.
But if they do stick people in university owned apartment buildings, they better step up security.
What about Branford? Berkeley? Issue there too?
Yeah, this situation really sucks. As a current sophomore in Calhoun I'm more than a little annoyed that not only will I probably never get to live in a residential college, but some of my friends might be forced off campus. (Yeah, forced.) And no blame at all, I might add, goes to anyone - least of all our Dean and Master, who are both wonderful, hard-working people doing their best to get us through this situation. It's annoying not to be able to point fingers here. I wish Yale's housing was more equitable for everyone though: it seems like so many people get screwed.
(Also, it's interesting that such a large portion of the class of 2011 wants to live on campus - why is this year different from others?)
Despite the suggestion in this article that Yale always finds room for students who request housing, I was told by my dean that Yale just didn't have room for my my junior year as I had taken a year off and that I would HAVE to move off campus.
I was understandably upset - finding an off campus apartment requires much more work than entering the room draw, and, given that I come from a poor family, coming up with a deposit was a daunting task. Despite all of this, being forced to move off campus was one of the best things that happened to me as an undergrad - it really is worth the hassle. You can eat when you want to (who really eats dinner EVERY day from 5pm-7pm and then fasts until lunch the next day at noon), you can stick around as long as you like during Christmas and the summer, and you don't need to buy Yale's outrageously priced meal and housing plans. You really save a lot of money off campus, get more space, and develop some healthy independence.
So, while I understand how upset you all are right now, cheer up a bit. Off campus living is really not that bad :)
Maybe we should let sophmores choose to live off campus.