<p>With the first admission deadline coming up next week, I thought it would be useful to centralize information on the FSU dorms (especially the two new ones), so students who get admitted can be prepared to apply for housing right away.</p>
<p>I know there are several other older dorm threads, but perhaps in this one, we can hear from current students or their parents to get an updated perspective on the dorm situation.</p>
<p>If you fall into this category, can you please tell us </p>
<li><p>what dorm you are in. How is your roommate?</p></li>
<li><p>If it was your first choice dorm</p></li>
<li><p>The condition of the dorm</p></li>
<li><p>Is it social and easy to meet new friends</p></li>
<li><p>Whether or not you are OOS or instate</p></li>
<li><p>Campus dining (good/bad/neutral) and if you had to do it over again, would you have selected the same meal plan you picked.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>If you want to add links to other dorm threads as well that would be useful, but I am trying to get updated info, if possible.</p>
<p>I believe Diviney is scheduled to be demolished and rebuilt in the next few years. I don't recall seeing anything that says they want to renovate it. The new building would probably be like Wildwood/DeGraff or Ragans.</p>
<p>My daughter is in Dorman. She is a transfer student who took time to decide between UNC Chapel Hill and FSU so she submitted her housing application near deadline.</p>
<p>We were a little worried about Dorman before arriving because we heard a few negatives, but she likes it. The rooms are big enough (just) and they definitely could be nicer, but she loves her roommate and has met a few really great people on her floor. Her RA started having little get together every few weeks - like a tea party or chat session - to meet and greet. This is how my D met her new best friend and they've been inseparable since. </p>
<p>My D is "instate", but we are a Navy family and have kept our FL residency for 18 years JUST so our kids could go to a great, but affordable school when the time came. However, we moved here over the summer from our last duty station in Bangor, WA so she doesn't know anyone at the U and is more like an OOS student as far as social connections go. </p>
<p>The dorm is pretty social, but not overly so. It really only seems to get loud on her floor over the weekends. They even have a few guys in the dorm that act as troubadors and play their instruments (bongos and guitar) in the elevator - she loves this.</p>
<p>She didn't take a meal plan. She's a vegetarian and prefers to cook for herself. There is a kitchen on every floor of Dorman equipped with stove/oven/microwave. We set her up with "garnet bucks" for eating at any of the campus eateries and she finds them very convenient. She especially likes breakfast at Suwannee where she can make her own waffles. Her roommate took the unlimited meal plan and seems happy with it, but I think my D will stick w/o one.</p>
<p>first of all thank you for your and/or your husbands service. That means alot to me.</p>
<p>As far as your dorm info goes, that was really helpful. Our sons is very social, but being oos from ny, we were wondering what the social environment was like. When we visited everyone we met was so helpful, firendly and nice. It really seems like a great place to go to school.</p>
<p>I am glad your daughter is off to such a great start at FSU. If our son get's in, we hope to apply right away for housing and have as good a choice as possible. It sounds from your posting that you really can't go wrong for the most part.</p>
<p>The only two dorms we have heard not great things about are Salley and Smith. We took a tour of Degraff and thought it was really nice.</p>
<p>Cybermom... are the newer dorms you listed (except for wildwood and degraff which appeared to be brand new) all recently updated and similiar to those two newer ones?</p>
<p>sounds like the minimal meal plan and lot's of garnet bucks are the way to go.</p>
<p>thanks everyone for the info so far.</p>
<p>To summarize:</p>
<p>Degraff/Wildwood: Both are brand new, opened Fall 2007. We visited Degraff, really nice, suite style, near the college of business and union area of campus.
Wildwood is closer to the athletic facilities (football stadium, Leach center etc)</p>
<p>Dorman</p>
<p>older dorm, but very social. not sure where its located on campus. </p>
<p>Yes all of the newer dorms were renovated in the last few years. They are suite style, you have to clean the bathrooms yourself and self-regulated visitation rather than traditional hall style. The older traditional halls are less expensive and have restrooms that are "cleaned" during the week with limited visitation and no meal plan required.</p>
<p>After the first month or so, most students are tired of eating in the cafeteria so don't lock in too many meals there. You have to purchase a meal plan if you live in Broward Hall, Bryan Hall, Cawthon Hall, Gilchrist Hall, Jennie Murphree Hall, Landis Hall or Reynolds Hall. The other dorms do not require that a meal plan be purchased.</p>
<p>I haven't had the time to provide my two cents, but i've lived in both gilchrist and degraff. Although i think both are exceptional buildings, I'll give the nod to gilchrist- talk about location, location.
Furthermore living in degraff has not been as great as expected, with new things always come new headaches, the building has alot of things that need to be worked out, the doors have a tendency to not open, the first floor flooded this week, fire alarms don't work, the elevators have gotten stuck quite a few times and just little things like that that happen with new structures. In terms of a dorm being social, it all comes up to the people, living in gilchrist i barely made the effort to talk to people on my floor, But now in degraff i emphasized getting to know everyone and have met about 40 people here.</p>
<p>In terms of getting a good dorm i would tell everyone to apply for a living learning community, im currently in the social science community in degraff and with that i was guranteed a spot in degraff, i take two classes downstairs, and you meet alot of people.</p>
<p>My top 10 list
Gilchrist
landis (honors)
wildwood
cawthon
degraff
reynolds
broward
bryan
jennie murphee
salley</p>
<p>thanks for the great info. its always really good to hear things from the students perspective.</p>
<p>Gilchrest is near landis green? right. That does seem like a good location. did you live there during the sumer? Is it near the suwanee dining hall? is it in similiar condition to degraff? how long ago was it renovated?</p>
<p>thanks for the info about the living learning communities. Out of the two newest dorms, it sounds like wildwood has a bit of a better location than degraff? </p>
<p>nycollegedad, yes gilchrist is near landis green, actually both are connected by a breezeway which doubles as a study area, and yes i lived there during the summer. the walking distance from gilchrist to suwannee was about 2 minutes. The building conditions really resemble degraff, everything is very similar in terms of layout and floorplan, although i felt that my room in gilchrist was larger, furthermore gilchrist used to be an honors dorm so its quality is considered pretty good, i believe it was renovated in the late '90s early 2000's?
as to your question about being insed other dorms yes I have, i've been inside every dorm except, kellum, smith,deviney, and the upper class dorms.</p>
<p>Although the newer suite-style dorms seem very appealing I'm concerned I won't get all the social experiences and opportunities as in the community style (at least for freshman year). I know in community style if I don't particularly like my roommate I can switch out fairly easily later on. Does this hold true with suite-style or do people usually stick with the same suite-mates all year? I also heard that in the suite-style dorms you don't have as much of the 'open-door' atmosphere as in the community, or does it depend more on the particular dorm/people? Lastly, is the self-clean bathroom become a common ugly problem among suites or is it usually no big deal?
Thanks! This battle between the dorm types has been driving me up the wall.</p>
<p>The traditional hall dorms encourage people to meet in the hallway since there is a common bathroom. The suite style is more like an apartment, so you need to make an effort to meet people outside of your suite-mates. A good RA will provide opportunities for socialization among the residents but as with anything, a good experience is based on your own positive attitude.</p>
<p>We just found out our daughter was assigned to Broward Hall. From what we can tell online, it looks like a nice place and great location. Does anyone have input on Broward, also does anyone know which bed is “Bed B”?</p>
<p>I had a couple of friends that lived in Broward last year, and they all really liked it. Their rooms were good sizes, and it was overall a really nice dorm with a good location (near suwannee and landis). As far as beds go, it’s basically first come first serve. hope this helped. :)</p>
<p>my son lived in Broward last year. It was actually his second choice. The room was great, location good, but he did not enjoy it much. He was assigned a sophomore as a roommate and although they stayed together all year, it wasn’t a great pairing. His RA did not do much to get people to meet each other and my son did not make a lot of friends in the dorm (he joined a fraternity to compensate). It was actually weird there when I visited. You’d pass other students in the hallway and they didn’t even nod to each other, much less speak. Hopefully, your daughter will have a better RA.</p>