<p>Thanks so much for the input. It sounds like there are positive experiences in all of the living situations. Also, it sounds as if he will be among kids that are like him in the engineering dorms. Thanks</p>
<p>ralph4^ Santa Lucia sounds perfect for engineering kids. Your boys sound like my son, although he likes playing sports for fun. Our hope is that he will room with engineering majors at Cerro. he already has a friend to room with. He will be computer science/software engineering major.<br>
Thanks for always sharing your boys’ experiences. It is so helpful!</p>
<p>My son just got an e-mail for a chat on-line from the Materials Engineering depart. on Tuesday. They sure are good at being welcoming! We can’t wait to hear more about it at Open House!</p>
<p>ralph4,</p>
<p>My friend’s freshman daughter, an Industrial Engineering major lives in Santa Lucia. There are definitely more guys than girls in the Living and Learning Program. Only two wings out of six are girls. She’s in a double. She’s also not a partier, so it works out well. Her mom did tell me that if she could choose again, she would go with Cerro Vista. More room and the option to cook healthier food. She claims the food is pretty bad at Cal Poly. 
But, that will come next year when she’s in Poly Canyon. She and her roommate get along and were randomly paired.</p>
<p>**ralph4 said:</p>
<p>Son #2 (now a freshman) got only 1 roommate in Santa Lucia, and they get along great. They have decided to live together next year in Poly Canyon, but they aren’t sure who else they will share an apartment with. They have until June to request additional roommates. </p>
<p>I think Santa Lucia was a good choice for my boys who are not into partying, or chasing girls. They are not really “out-doorsy” guys either. I think they mostly like video games, music, movies, books, and just hanging out. There are lots of guys like them in Santa Lucia! Also, all the people in Santa Lucia have to study alot and do lots of difficult school work, so they can help each other and not have to be jealous of hall mates that have way lighter loads. 
**</p>
<p>Hey guys. I was recently admitted to Cal Poly and found choosing where I wanted to live my first year a bit difficult. Because I wasn’t able to go to the open house, I didn’t really get that much info. Do you guys think these are good choices? I chose #1 Sierra Madre, #2 Muir and #3 Tenaya. I really wanted sociable dorms where I could make a lot of friends and have fun and party lol. Any advice? Any suggestions on switching?</p>
<p>Sierra Madre is just about everyone’s first choice for a sociable dorm so you didn’t go wrong there. Muir and Tenaya are red bricks and I know first hand that Muir rocks; my son is there. They also have great locations. So, given your priorities, I think you made good choices and should not change a thing. What I do recommend is that you find and specify a roommate rather than depending on the luck of the draw. The best dorm in the world won’t make up for a lousy roommate. I speak from experience however, it was in a previous century.</p>
<p>I was wondering does Santa Lucia have a good social life? I know that Sierra Madre has a good social life but I would like to have other engineer’s around. I went to the open house and toured both dorms and i can’t decide. I’m leaning towards Santa Lucia right now because of the living learning program.</p>
<p>One comment we heard from people in the engineering discussions was that no matter which dorms you choose, there will be engineering students around! There are so many of them! In the freshman year, students will be taking similar core courses for engineering, so they will see familiar faces in their classes. If you choose the mixed major dorms, there will still be engineers nearby!</p>
<p>My son and I went inside 2 more Cerro Vista apartments. Each time we seem to go into a girls’ suite, but they have all been different. One student’s room was very neat and organized and the others looked more like a typical teenager, but not bad. The common areas looked lived in, but nice as well. My son is still choosing the apartments for him. He will like having his own bedroom and the bathroom situation is nice. We feel that there will be a lot of interaction between him and his 3 roommates and also the students in rooms nearby. The apartment complex has Monday night cooking (and eating) classes and something fun every weekend. They have a nice common room and outdoor areas for hanging out. We do agree that it will not be as social as the traditional dorms. That’s okay for some kids. My son’s department will be very close because it is small and I am sure he will make lots of friends that way. he can also go to the UU for fun playing pool and going bowling. Lots of ways to meet friends no matter where you live!</p>
<p>momofmv, my S has decided on Cerro Vista, too. He likes the idea of retreating to his own bedroom (he’s like that at home) when he wants, too. His dept. has at least 5 clubs/organizations that he can join that are very social and he will most likely spend a lot of time in his dept. He and one of his potential roommates were talking about the different things they know how to cook and they were surprisingly healthy. :)</p>
<p>That is great news lilmom. I hope he gets Cerro and I agree that having a bedroom to themselves will be a plus. There will be plenty of ways to get involved through departments and clubs and just hanging out with roommates plus the apartment activities. My son will join one of his department clubs for sure. They can’t be social all of the time! You are lucky that your son and his possible roommate will be cooking healthy. We will have a crash course in simple meals for the summer at our house! Another plus is that they will be ready for the following year when they are in an apartment or Poly Canyon and might not have a meal plan at all. It will be a nice transition to have a meal plan and the ability to fix meals at the dorm. The other dorms will have that chance too because they have micros and community kitchens. But for Cerro kids, it is a must. They also need to learn about cleaning up though!</p>
<p>RE: Insurance</p>
<p>Be sure to check with your homeowners insurance policy carrier. Ours will cover our son as part of our policy (no additional cost) if he lives in an on-campus dorm. Once he moves to an apartment, he’ll have to get a separate renter’s policy. I’m not sure where on-campus apartments fit in.</p>
<p>Not wanting to be an alarmist or anything, I just thought I’d share a concern that is often not thought about. Just in the last week I have heard two scary stories about boys at college getting depressed. The mom of one boy couldn’t get her college son to answer any of her calls, text messages, or emails. Finally she got a friend to call repeatedly, and finally he answered. He had been sleeping 16 hours a day, not attending classes, and not eating. He was just holed up in his room and said he felt like he was in prison. He went through 3 locked doors just to get to his “cell” (a locked door to get in the on-campus building he lived in, another to get in his suite, and another to get in his room). This kid is not very social and apparently his suite-mates didn’t notice his lack of coming and going.</p>
<p>Another mom shared that just before her son left for college, she learned about a friend’s son who after going off to college his freshman year also would not answer his phone or messages. Having just been assigned “pot-luck” roommates, the parents did not have any contact info for their son’s roommates, and so had no-one to call to check on him. When they finally got school officials involved, they investigated and found him locked in his room dead. </p>
<p>I know these stories are maybe considered extreme, but I have heard that depression among college students is a growing problem. And in light of the Cal Poly student that committed suicide this past fall, it is something we should all be aware of. One benefit to the traditional dorms freshman year is that they share a bedroom with another person, so it is not likely that they could go unnoticed if they never got out of bed or never left the room.</p>
<p>A very sad and concerning problem. Depression is a real worry among teenagers and adults. I understand the concern about the apartments because the kids have their own rooms. It is important that they keep their doors open when they can and not stay in their rooms all of the time. Everyone needs to spend time with other people. My son will have a roommate in Cerro that is a friend. He likes to study and have some space to himself, but he is not anti-social. I think the problem here is that people categorize the kids who want to live in Cerro as un-social and the kids in the traditional dorms as “party animals”. I am sure there are both types of students in all of the dorms.</p>
<p>All parents need to stay in contact with their kids and watch for signs of trouble. My family and I plan on visiting our son and talking with him on a regular basis. It is important for kids to watch out for each other too. No matter if they live in a traditional dorm or an apartment style. Depression can happen to someone in a house full of people. I think that Cal Poly is a warm and supportive environment for our kids, unlike some more traditional and competitive schools. I love the teamwork that is emphasized and the accessibility of the professors.</p>
<p>One nice thing the on-campus housing has for free is a landline phone, one per dorm room or one per apartment. Hope that is offered again this upcoming year. That phone is for calling out locally, not long distance. So at move-in, we put that phone number in our cell phone address books. Not wanting to bother my son or his roommate(s), I havent called the landline except once, when I couldnt reach him by cell phone for several days. Finally resorted to calling the apartments landline, got my son, and found out his cell phone hadnt been working for almost a week and he was too busy to go downtown & get it fixed. Got Verizon to call the landline and help my son program his cell phone so it would work again. It was just a relief to know he was OK and his cell phone was working again. Now we have IM as thats been a way to ‘see’ him & know hes OK, but not contact or bug him.</p>
<p>A good tip I picked up on this forum is to try and ‘skype’ once a week with your first year student (if you have the webcam/microphone). It really helps to ‘see’ how they’re doing as well has hear their voice. We don’t make it every week but we do ‘skype’ 2-3 times per month…</p>
<p>We start the skype conversation with IM because of the trouble we’ve had with skype. (I guess I shouldn’t complain since skype-ing has been a much better experience than the phone calls.) All of the skype problems are on the Cal Poly end. Do you have the same trouble?</p>
<p>Nope - skype has worked well for us … even on Vista</p>
<p>Thanks. Could be the OS or a few other things. Will give them a try.</p>
<p>Skype also works great on the Mac.</p>