Dorms/Residential Communities

<p>What are some things that only current students know about the dorms and residential communities? Mainly looking for things that are not livable from the admissions office/university/</p>

<p>Sorry a few typos
Mainly looking for things that are not available from the official university websites/pamphlets. </p>

<p>North Quad is hell on your schedule. They try and promote it big time because it’s full of other freshman, but it’s a hell of a long way from campus when you’re tired, cold or late. </p>

<p>“North Quad is hell on your schedule. They try and promote it big time because it’s full of other freshman, but it’s a hell of a long way from campus when you’re tired, cold or late.” </p>

<p>North Quad (aka North Quadrangle) is a realtively new (2 years old?) building roughly a 30 second walk from all of the buildings on central campus. You may have meant North Campus rather than North Quad.</p>

<p>There’s also essentially no freshmen in North Quad.</p>

<p>That said, everything he said about North CAMPUS is true. If you have any opportunity at all to secure a spot on Central (such as Honors) then I’d recommend you do it. Residential College is a bit more of a commitment I think, so you should actually want to do that.</p>

<p>There’s also very conflicting opinions about Markley as a dorm. I know people that lived in it and it was pretty much 50/50 between loving it and hating it. Depends on how social you are and how fine you are with living in cramped spaces I guess.</p>

<p>Not sure if you’re a guy or a girl, but the female dorms (Newberry and Barbour, not Martha Cook) have the best location on Central Campus, some of the worst food, and tiny but well-maintained rooms. Oh, and they’re not convents.</p>

<p>But is it more convenient for engineering students to live on the North Campus since it’s closer to the engineering buildings? (from what it looks like on the map)</p>

<p>North Campus is just as bad as people describe it. Oxford is actually really convenient for social life since it’s near all the frats. Markley is not as social as many people think. All the central campus dorms (east, south, north quad) are super nice. </p>

<p>Most freshmen engineering students only take one class per semester on North Campus (engineering 100 & 101). The rest of the schedule is generally made up of classes like calc, physics, chemistry, etc which are all on central campus. The engineering courses don’t start taking up the majority of the schedule till sophomore year so being on north campus is not helpful re getting to class until then. Even so, most would prefer to live on central campus because it is easier to socialize. The only way to guarantee living on central campus is to get into honors or one of the residential communities. </p>

<p>I actually prefer to live on north campus lol. Everyone was trying to convince me that north campus is death last year when I was filling out the dorm app and I bought into their rhetoric, but it’s actually not that bad. There’s alot less distractions for me I have a couple of engin classes on north campus next semester as a freshman. Markley is a utter crap hole barring the social life and the location though. </p>

<p>My freshman D does not mind living on North Campus either, but all her classes except one are there. She is in engineering and music. It can be a bit dead, especially on weekends, but she doesn’t mind the quiet for studying. She does go to central campus some evenings and weekends with friends. </p>

<p>It’s more likely that as a freshmen, you will be placed on North Campus. Some people don’t mind it, others hate it. I’m a freshmen, and I love Central. So I am extremely grateful that I was interested in the Residential College, otherwise taking the bus from North to Central would have gotten old very quickly.</p>

Do freshmen get to choose living in Central or not?
And if anyone knows, when do we start signing up for dorms? I wanna secure a sport in the Central…

@bbsimmons‌ How do you choose your dorm?

Other than applying to the honors program or a residential learning community you can’t “choose your dorm.” Honors students live in south quad and the residential learning communities are in various dorms, many in the Hill dorms (Mosher-Jordan, Alice Lloyd, etc.). If you are female, you can ask for one of the all female dorms on central campus. Otherwise, where you live is assigned fairly randomly. You do get to give a preference as to what type of room you want such as single, double, triple or quad. But you cannot request a specific dorm.

HSM1417 hit the nail right on the head.
I’m in the Residential College which is stationed in East Quad. All of the Michigan Learning Communities (MLCs), have their own requirements though. So it’s not like you can just pick whichever dorm you’d prefer.
@mafuyu I signed up for housing in May.

Around 70% of freshmen that are not in any residential programs will be assigned to the North Campus. There is one question about location preference on the application. Basically, if you don’t mind living in the North Campus, you will end up in the North Campus.