My son finally narrowed down his big list of potential schools down to 1 - looks like he is going to Alabama in the fall!
Presidential scholarship, honors college, and aerospace engineering. We are from Michigan, and he does not know others going to UA. Enrollment and housing deposits put in yesterday, and now we are finishing the housing process, but we have a few questions:
On our campus visit, we toured Ridgecrest South (wow! college dorms aren’t what they were in my day…). He wants to be in honors housing and prefers suite style. Is RCS the way to go?
When we went through the housing portal, you name your top 3 preferred housing styles, but dont specifically choose the building. He choose “Honors Suite Style” as his top priority - does this automatically mean RCS? Do you get to pick from options later in the process?
He is scanning the profiles on the roommate selection tool as I type this. Is this the best way to find a roommate? He isn’t typically a facebook’er, but I’ve seen some mention of that as a way to network with future roommates. Thoughts?
What happens after he puts in requests to 3 of the profiles in the selection tool?
His best bet is to find compatible roommates who will be participating in housing selection and can pull him into an honors suite. Otherwise he’ll be placed by Housing. They will try to accommodate his preferences, but they can only assign him to what’s left after room selection is over. Better to use the Roommate Finder, Facebook, the parents’ facebook groups or a similar site to find a roommate who can pull him in during room selection.
I am not positive, because it has changed each year my daughter has been there, but I think Honors Suite Style also includes Ridgecrest East and West. They’re located across the street from RCS and are suite style but with slightly different floorplans. I personally prefer the RCE and RCW floorplan over that of RCS. If he likes the suite style dorms, he might want to choose regular suite style as his second choice - there are plenty of honors students living in the regular suite style dorms.
Hi,
Since he deposited late for housing, he won’t be able to choose his actual dorm/room/etc…unless he finds someone who deposited by Feb 1st to “pull him in.” He can likely find someone on the Facebook group for his incoming class. Right now, there aren’t a lot of boys in that group, but soon there will be.
From the Bama Housing website:
Incoming freshmen who submitted their complete housing application by February 1, 2016, will be eligible to take part in online room selection in Spring 2016. During this process, students will be able to pick the space in which they want to live in the fall, selecting from available spaces for which they are eligible.
Students who applied for housing from February 2 and after will receive their assignment from our housing staff, beginning in mid-May, in order of when they completed their housing application. A student may also assign up to three confirmed roommates, if there is vacant space within their room, suite or apartment. Roommates must also be eligible to live in that residence hall.
DS never did the Facebook thing, nor did any of his current roommates. He accepted one request on the roommate finder in Housing & then he pulled the kid in when he was able to choose his dorm room.
His roommates did the same thing. The guys really don’t seem to obsess over it like the girls do. DS didn’t know anyone going either and his 3 roommates are from OOS. Two are from IL and one is from FL. They have all become great friends and I couldn’t be happier, because it doesn’t always happen like that.
Thank you all. This info is very helpful - He’s heading off to facebook right now. Would have been awesome if he had deposited by the feb. 1 deadline, but no going back now…
My DD had the first sign up time, earlier than another planned room-mate. Pulled two gals in that would not have gotten into honors housing w/o getting pulled in. One had an older brother at UA, but the housing ‘rules’ changed and parents and DD were caught unaware until too late.
Yes, our experience was most boys are more laid back about matching up for sign up. However needing to get pulled in, I would be seriously trying to get someone to confirm to pull son in to desired housing.
I guess they turned away 800 upperclassmen that wanted to try and stay in the dorms for next year. I am curious to see if Fr numbers increase for next year. Curious to know if UA thought of building dorms for upperclassmen that want to stay on campus?
I called housing yesterday to inquire about upperclassman that may want to stay on campus past their freshman year. The gal had said they turned 800 students away for next year or had turned 800 away this school year. Either way, I went whoa! That needs attention.
So there is no advantage in putting down a deposit at this point vs. waiting until May1? DD is seriously considering UA but hasn’t decided yet. Still needs to visit another accepted school.
If there was a reason to put down a deposit, we might just to make sure her housing is OK if she picks UA but if it really doesn’t help at this point (since we are after Feb 1) probably no reason to.
Putting down a deposit is essential if your student wants to be able to have any say in who her roommates are (by getting pulled in by at least one roommate, and they can share one end of the suite), and to give her a better chance to get Honors Housing.
There is a lot of on-campus housing but so much has been converted to Honors Housing, and then with the ever increasing size of each entering class, supply is limited. Not every Honors student wants to live in Honors, but you can only live in Honors if part of the Honors college. My son went ahead and applied and did get one of the 150 slots open to returning Honors students, but decided he did not want to spend a third year living in a 4-room suite. He’s hoping to get a smaller suite, with more room than RCS, and, if not, he’s planning on finding an off-campus studio or 1 bedroom. He will miss the convenience of living on campus though.
Good evening,
That 800 figure is significantly high (by a few hundred) and does not reflect how many students we have been able to pull off the waitlist and allow to complete their application for next year. I can’t give you a correct number, because that too will be outdated almost immediately as we will continue to pull returning students off their waitlist.
Also, keep in mind that returner demand varies from year to year. Last year, we were able to meet the demand from returning students. So we really don’t know what the situation will be until each year’s initial process.
@Big10Grad - we are in the same boat. My DD is not visiting UA, UMD or GT until the end of the March and Pitt early April. She has accepted the fact that housing may be an issue. She knows it is only for one year and at least she is guaranteed to be on campus. She decided that she will try to find someone on FB who will pull her in if she chooses UA. At this point, we have decided that the difference between March 1 and May 1 is negligible.
@UAHousing Does UA have university owned/run apartments?
My oldest daughter went to UMN and lived in the dorms her first year. She then moved to a university apartment with two friends, a fourth person was added by the university, that was on a nine month lease. This was a good middle step before she went out on her own (private apt.) with the same friends for Junior year.
I looked on the housing site and could not find anything that indicates that UA has the same type of thing available.
We have two apartment communities on campus Bryce Lawn and Highlands. Additionally, we generally have a contract for some space in an off-campus property, but that lease is renewed year-to-year. Currently, the complex we have a contract with is the Lofts at city Center.
@UAHousing - what is the likely outcome for children like mine and that of @Big10Grad? My DD is in the Honors College but will likely commit very late. Will she still be able to at least be in a suite style dorm?
DS is a freshman. No university apartments I’m aware of but there is a robust community of off campus complexes that only allow college students (there are other colleges there) and have amenities and regular shuttles to campus. This is what my DS is doing next year. Unfortunately they all offer 12 month leases but they lease by bedroom so you are not on the hook for the entire apartment. These complexes have events and other things geared towards students and they are pretty safe.
Honestly most universities only guarantee one year of housing if even that so this is not unusual. DS didn’t even try for on campus housing next year as we correctly assumed with ever growing freshmen classes and no new housing being built we couldn’t imagine enough housing available to all upper classmen who wanted it.
@PhilaSkiMom please feel free to email us and we can discuss options. We cannot that any specific kind will still be available, only that we will have a space for all incoming freshmen who apply. My email is jgmcgee@sa.ua.edu if you want to email me about your specific student.
Good luck. Have him go ahead and start contacting people on the housing profile list. Presidential Village is identical to RCS but is not honors. Try the UA facebook parent page of 2020, they may be able to help. The student FB page will not help much if at all.