<p>Nearly 700 OOS freshmen who wanted on campus housing did not get it last year. They really need to get more dorms done ASAP.</p>
<p>Crap, really? I'm guessing Minnesota counts as OOS despite the tuition reciprocity. Do you know if you have a better chance the sooner you get your request in?</p>
<p>What's your source!?</p>
<p>I'm OOS from San Antonio. I have the choice right now to pick a dorm room right this minute because one of my top choices was a Learning Community. Should I choose!?</p>
<p>it was in a UW planning document about why they needed to build more dorms. I say pcik and hope for the best. It's a lottery but signing for a learning community might help some as they cost more and fewer might select them. Private dorms will still have rooms in August if you need one.</p>
<p>I went with a room on the 7th floor of Chadbourne. I really should have done this yesterday when rooms on the 5th floor were available...</p>
<p>It's easy to say build more dorms when you only look at the UW's PR pieces that are asking for money. </p>
<p>UW Housing has already spent millions ($65 million in the past 4 years!) to build student housing that isn't needed and have raised housing prices for students 29% in the past 3 years. Now they want another $67 milllion for more beds so they can house this supposed 700 overflow of freshman each year. Does that mean yet another 29% increase in prices? </p>
<p>There are 6,800 beds in UW Housing. There are 5,500 freshman every year. If they didn't house 1,300 upperclassmen there would be room for ALL of the freshman. The 700 overflow number is intentional...they make the choice to not have enough room so they can get lobby for more dorms so they can make more money.</p>
<p>It's all PR and none of it is good for the students. If they want to house all of the freshman they can make that choice -- they chose not to. It's all political - no one in UW Housing is thinking of the students, they're thinking of their profits.</p>
<p>As the document stated, there are many good reasons to have some upperclass students in the dorms. Some prefer to stay in the dorms and not take on the hassles of having an apt with a year lease when they only will be in town 9 months. There are often huge financial hassles with roommates. Some are RAs and transfer students. Some are athletes.</p>
<p>Most for the new dorms have gone to rplace the obsolete OGG dorm which is now gone. The rest of the older dorms are getting much needed renovations as most have not been touched since they were built over 40 years ago. You ever see a house that has had 40 years of hard wear and tear that does not need a major overhaul? Also standards of what students expect in housing have changed. Common showers, concrete bunker rooms and tiny spaces per person are out. Most kids today grew up having there own bedroom and bath and do not relish sharing with others. </p>
<p>The UW does not make a significant profit from dorms. Any surplus is set into a fund to maintain and repair the buildings. They need new roofs and new building systems every so often and that needs to have money in place when it comes due. UW R&B rates are among the lower in the Big 10. That did not keep the state from raiding the dorm repair accounts and stealing the money that should have gone back into the dorms. THAT was outright breaking with the entire operating philosophy for the dorms to be non-profit and put all the money back into keeping the dorms in good repair. Not an easy thing with 1000's of very active and not always well-behaved students going through the dorms every year.</p>
<p>All the funding for new dorms will not come from the taxpayers. Also there are closer to 6000 new freshman and 1500 new transfer students every year.</p>
<p>Is this a post about the merits of res hall life and the need to update aging facilities or was it a post about adding beds because there's a genuine need for more rooms? Again, there's plenty of room for these dejected 700 puppies the UW trots out every fall. Renovations and staying up to date is one thing; manipulating public perception and treating new students like PR pawns every fall is another. </p>
<p>As evidenced by the continued increases in housing costs it would seem that ultimately it's the parent's and students that end up paying for these additional beds. </p>
<p>To clarify my numbers: there were 5,774 Freshman and 1,238 Sophomore, Junior and Senior Transfers enrolled in 2008 according to the UW's Data Digest (<a href="http://apa.wisc.edu/DataDigest/DATA_DIGEST_09.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://apa.wisc.edu/DataDigest/DATA_DIGEST_09.pdf</a>). There are no increases for Freshman projected and only an increase of 50 transfers per year projected. (<a href="http://apa.wisc.edu/Enrollment%5B/url%5D">http://apa.wisc.edu/Enrollment</a> Projection.pdf).</p>