<p>My daughter will be entering JMU as a freshman in the fall. She has decided to live in the dorms for two years. Should she sign up for guaranteed second year housing now? Does housing for sophmores fill up quickly, so that if she didn't do it now, she would likely not get housing as a second year student?</p>
<p>She was debating if she did do it, what housing community to request since she doesn't really know the campus yet or where most sophmores would want to live.</p>
<p>We signed up for second year along with the freshman year. If you want to live on campus second year, you should do this now since housing is tight at JMU. The residence life office said we do not have to do the housing preferences for the second year until late in the freshman year. They realize that incoming students can not determine their second year preferences now. So, just go in and sign the contract for second year and leave the preferences blank for now. Then you will be assured now of having a place to live on campus during the second year.</p>
<p>Thanks, abdad! We went ahead and signed a contract for the second year. We would definitely like her to live on campus for two years. After that, we are fine with her moving into an apartment. My husband is concerned that she may make friends with people who are planning on living off campus sophmore year, then she will be “left out” back in the dorms. I am pretty sure that plenty of people will live on campus for the second year. </p>
<p>We thought about that too, but we are insisting on signing up for a second year on campus. There will surely be plenty of friends to get an off-campus place with junior year.</p>
<p>I teach at JMU, and among my advisees quite a few choose to live on campus as sophomores. There are certainly some who live off campus as sophomores, but it does not seem to be any sort of social life determining factor :)…</p>
<p>My son just finished freshman year, had signed the two year contract as an admit, and will be living on campus as a sophomore. There are some of his friends, about half, moving off campus sophomore year. He was not sure, mid year, if he wanted to stay on, but now he is glad that he did. Some of his friends are moving off, and I think they are not quite sure they made the right decision. I don’t know what housing preference you mean, at selection time, for on campus, everyone was given a random lottery number, and you choose from what housing is left at that time, at least that’s how it was with him.</p>