My daughter will be a freshman next year , in honors and studying Environmental Engineering. The only roomates she has been able to find are not in Honors. They are looking at rooming in non-honors Presidential. My daughter is a fun-loving , studious non-partier and will not be rushing a sorority but may rush Theta Tau engineering fraternity. What are your thoughts regarding honors versus non-honors dorms? Also, if you know of any good potential roomates for her, let me know. Thanks!
Honors students live in all dorms, not just Ridgecrest. IMO-What is more important, is that she feels she will be comfortable and compatible with the roommates she chooses. Also, many people assume that students in the Honors dorms will be more studious and less the party-type. This is not true at all!
There are plenty studious non-partiers who are not in Honors, and there are Honors kids who party 7 days a week. There are also plenty of Honors kids in non-Honors dorms. Because the dorms are occupied mostly by freshmen, there is near complete turnover every year so you don’t know from year to year which students will choose which dorms (other than that the Honors dorm will have only Honors kids). So a particular dorm (or floor in a dorm) might be a party hall one year and not at all the next, and vice versa.
I would make a dorm decision more based on the roommate(s) I find compatible and choose to live with than on an Honors dorm vs. a non-Honors dorm.
I disagree with Roo17 and beth’s mom (to some extent). They are correct, there absolutely are both non-partiers and very serious students who are not in Honors dorms. There are also both serious partiers and not so serious students in the Honors dorms. However, on balance, the stereotypes hold true. My DD and I just talked about this last night and she felt strongly that the best move she ever made in life was living in the Honors dorms with students like herself who were serious about school and put academics first, and fun second.
I agree with @TV4caster. My ds lived RCE (honors dorm) last year. There was not much partying that went on (at least that spilled over into the public areas), yet ds met a wonderful group of friends that got together weekly to cook dinner and watch a movie. He had a friend that was an RA at presidential and she complained of the puke in the elevators on weekends. He said they called Presidetial ‘Party Dorm’. I am sure not every floor was that bad, but I do think there is a difference between honors and non-honors. And RCE might be different than RCS, as RCS is bigger.
Again, there will be partiers as well as “problems” in both non-honors dorms and honors dorms. I personally know 2 kids who switched from Ridgecrest to Presidential mid-year due to these issues. You can chose your roommates wisely but that does not always work out as planned either. It is truly a crap shoot. A good RA is also not always a guarantee and was part of the problem stated above.
If your daughter likes the girls and thinks it will be a good match, I don’t think it would be a huge issue not to be in Honors housing.
However, should she feel more comfortable in Honors, she can just go in as a single. If she has an early selection date, just sign up for a space in one of the open rooms.
DS had one guy from the Bama site he pulled in with him, never even contacted him before moving in. He also picked a room in the dorm he wanted that had open spaces. Two of those guys he is still living w/ off campus as a junior.
When we moved out of the dorms at the end of the year, the RA told him it was a real pleasure having him and his group in his dorm and they would be missed. He was in Ridgecrest West.