He’s going to see if one will trade - problem is, so far many are girls…but, yes, I think he would prefer I-House if it was a single. Not sure they can make the trade on their own or if they have to wait until week 3 - which would be a huge pain to try to move after school has started. Why over-enroll a second year - especially when taking a large portion of kids ED 1&2? Why not let first year students have the option of living off campus? Not that I want him off campus his first year…but he’s really stressed about not having any alone time. I never lived in the dorms - lived in an apartment all through undergrad and grad school, and it was a million years ago so I can understand his worries.
I feel the pain. Many were delivered a blow today, and very few will find an alternative. I encouraged my daughter to choose the bright side - 1 year is a drop in the barrel. They’ll adapt. Silver lining - they are Maroons, no small feat.
I hope all of you work out the room assignments.
"Why over-enroll a second year "
Good question. But if the kids like yours who send in their deposit three hours after ED 1 acceptance and still don’t get one of their dorm choices much less the single they requested, that sounds like another issue since as of ED 1 they surely couldn’t have been over-enrolled… yet. Wonder if some of this has to do with a gender imbalance in ED 1 acceptance? Could it possibly be that most of the ED 1 acceptances and athlete/gap acceptances prior to that were boys? Seems unlikely. Anyone else have ideas?
I wonder if it’s due to the 2nd years staying in the houses at a higher rate, last year it seemed most were pretty happy with what they got.
We were at a UChicago Send Off party today and of the 10-12 incoming UChicago first years, the ones that applied ED1 and deposited within a week of the acceptance were in one of the dorms on their preference sheet. The two that were RD admits and deposited in April were both in doubles (separate doubles, they didn’t know each other prior to the event) in I House. Anecdotally, it sounds like a lot of “new” doubles in I House. Possibly part of the recent renovation.
@CU123, @milee30 there are probably a number of factors involved. Obviously, UChicago is very deliberately expanding the size of the college. Hyde Park itself has experienced increasing rent over time which, of course, slows down and/or delays the exodus from the dorms. The dorms themselves are getting pretty nice which also delays/slows down the exodus. Finally, the College might be viewing this squeeze as a temporary problem till the new dorm is built. Sure, it’s uncomfortable for a couple of years but then housing capacity will expand by 1,300.
Had another thought about this last night. Last year, like previous years, Class of 2021 housing queue was established by date of deposit. Do we actually know whether that was the same for Class of 2022? The number of dissatisfied customers makes me wonder whether they changed to a general lottery once they had all the confirmed enrollments. For those who are part of the Class of 2022, do you know for sure whether your deposit established your queue placement or were you going off what you had read on CC from prior years?
My son recalls the website saying that “your priority is established by date of deposit” or words to the effect
Our understanding was the same as the prior poster - that deposit date established queue placement. And from the small sample we talked to today, that seemed to be the case. Kids who deposited within a week of ED 1 acceptance (and the 3 athletes who deposited in October) all were in a dorm that was on their preference sheet. Not necessarily their #1 choice, but one of the three. The only students who weren’t in one of their three choices were RD admits. Again, small sample size though.
One of the parents of an RD admit was fairly disappointed in her son’s double in IHouse. She said they talked to housing in April before they deposited and they were assured they weren’t last in line and would likely get at least one of their three choices. They took a risky play, though and figured since they were likely to get at least one of their three choices, they’d list their top 2 preferences and as their 3rd list one that was almost certainly full, which would mean (they thought) it would mean a greater chance of him getting one of the top 2… didn’t work. I House double.
"They took a risky play, though . . . " Such risky plays on the part of others may well have impacted their selections. When the advice is that you will probably get one of your three choices, that’s always with the underlying assumption that you follow any specified guidelines and that you remain flexible in your preferences including mixing new and old dorms. For instance, if half the enrolled class lists North, Max P, and South, they might have a higher likelihood of ending up in a double in I-House than if they had included BJ as one of those choices.
I read through the facebook page today and there are a large number of kids who did get into North, Max P, South, Shitchcock, and BJ as they asked. My son’s house has 22 people in North that are the class of 22. I’m pretty sure the large number of disappointed has to do with large class, less capacity as mentioned above, but also I think it appears to be also amplified by the fact that the disappointed, are saying so and those who aren’t disappointed are relatively quiet.
On the Facebook page the vast majority of folks are those who are in IHouse.
I think the dissatisfied ones are more vocal, so maybe that’s why it seems as if it’s a large number.
Hope everyone gets their preferences.
^ Squeaky Wheel very likely. Why say anything if you got your choice, especially if the convo is directed by those who didn’t. Makes sense. A similar phenomenon happened with the unusually harsh curves of the June SAT. Obviously there were tons of kids who did just fine but those who were expecting better than actual were pretty vocal about it. The situation ended up snowballing on social media.
Class of '22 looks to be over 60 higher than the previous year; perhaps with the renovations in I-House they’ve opened up more rooms. Hence the grief because that’s where they are putting the “overflow”. I-House not the most popular dorm.
Regarding people being a squeaky wheel, I haven’t seen this in person or here. At the gathering today nobody led with a complaint and every incoming first year who discussed housing was unfailingly polite, upbeat and gracious in the discussion. No squeaky wheels. One of the moms I talked to wasn’t happy, but only discussed housing after someone directly asked her; she wasn’t bringing up any whining or saying anything unreasonable.
It’s normal and understandable as a parent to be disappointed when your kid has a setback; and it’s normal and reasonable to view a kid not getting any of their choices of dorm or roommate # as a setback. If those parents are worried and want to vent a little, I’m willing to listen and not judge them a squeaky wheel.
The UChicago event we attended today was really nice. We didn’t go in knowing anybody there, yet had a good time meeting and talking to incoming first years, their parents and alums. Very nice group and interesting to talk to - made me grateful my son is going to college with people like this.
@BrianBoiler at #30, the question is whether an applicant fixed the dorm preference by “old” vs.“new” rather than mixing it up a bit. That’s understandable but it might have compromised further an ability to get a top 3. This is water under the bridge - my own kid pulled a similar risky play last year and lucked out (she was ED2). She might easily have ended up in I-House had the class size been higher. S19 is following this news with interest; his heart is set on BJ if he’s admitted but he’s not applying till 2nd round.
I-House might not be the most popular dorm but it sure has a lovely front room on the first floor. D loves BJ not for the luxurious settings but for the atmosphere of the place and for her house. If the house system in I-House is just as vibrant, then the choice of dorm will be quickly forgotten.
@milee30 - was referring to the vocals on the FB page, not a hosted event! My kid would have been disappointed not to get one of her choices and I would have been disappointed for her and felt it to be a bit of a damp spot on an otherwise wonderful start to the year. And those who are vocalizing will very likely see some extra attention by Housing to make sure their experience is a positive one. Squeaking is a strategy, not a judgement 
^^Agreed re: post # 33 about meeting other parents and students past and present at the Launchpad event. The New York event was hosted by an alum at Goldman Sachs headquarters. It was so nice to talk with all of them—they were all so gracious. We, too, felt fortunate that my son would be attending school with people like that.
And definitely squeak and vent if you have to! Never know, one may find some solutions after being vocal.
@uocparent Yes they do know how to pick the hosts, the one in Denver is hosted by the Jim Hillary who runs his own private equity firm.
@JBStillFlying both of our DD lucked out in getting there first choices (out of ED2) last year, but that doesn’t seem to be the case this year.
@JBStillFlying - the process is definitely still by date of deposit. From the housing application form:
“Housing Application 2018
Room assignments will be made using the date of payment of the enrollment deposit, wherever possible, on the information provided below…Our goal is to house as many students as possible in a residence hall and room type that they prefer; however, each year there are buildings and room types for which the demand exceeds the number of spaces available. In these cases, some of the students who have requested a particular residence hall or room type will not be able to receive an assignment there. While it is not our preference, some students will be assigned to live in a community or room type that was not one of their three requested residence halls.”
Despite the qualifying language above, I will also add that they MOST definitely said, at the Housing info session on Admitted Students Weekend, that it’s “rare” that students don’t get their top three. I remember that session well because the Head of Housing was the only staff member we met that weekend that rubbed us the wrong way. In response to a question, he said to an incoming student, “Look, we’re really good at this.” Very snippy. There was an air of “you’re overreacting” in response to questions. But they confirmed deposit date order.
My kid got his second choice with his requested roommate, so he is pretty happy. But I will tell you that the number of kids who did not can’t be dismissed as a handful of squeaky wheel outliers. A significant number of kids who applied ED did not get their 3 preferences. At first glance I thought this was the result of an unusually large rush for all of them to be in the same couple of “trending” dorms. But what explains the large number of kids who requested doubles and got singles? Something went wonky this year.
I guess for me it comes down to that false promise.If they framed the process as “nothing is guaranteed” or even had a lottery process, kids would be disappointed but not pissed. They will need to take better care not to use such emphatic language if they can’t deliver.
The former explains the latter. The two newest dorms, North and South, mostly consist of “pure” doubles. Max P (older, but pretty centrally located) is the other large dorm with a significant number of doubles (in a suite format). Other dorms are either mostly singles (B-J, I-House, Snitchcock) or small enough that they’re a negligible share of the housing stock (Stony). And the College will move heaven and earth to avoid putting first-years in Vue 53, because that community is a self-selecting group of students with minimal interest in house culture, interacting with others in their house, etc. This makes Vue 53 a very bad support network for any first-year who’s having trouble adjusting, needs advice on classes, clubs, etc, or just wants to spend time with other people.
The upshot is that most of the doubles are in the new dorms, and if space in the new dorms is tight then doubles are going to be in short supply too.