Housing Lottery

<p>I think most people who decided to room with their pre-college friends and aren't happy with it, never thought it through. I'm going to MIT, of course I've over-analyzed the situation... HAHA.</p>

<p>Hi :) How many percents do you think people can get their 1st, 2nd, or 3rd choice in Housing Lottery?</p>

<p>Just out of curiosity, how hard is it to get into McCormick(and getting a single as well)?</p>

<p>Last year,

[quote=<a href="http://www-tech.mit.edu/V125/N35/housinglottery.html"&gt;http://www-tech.mit.edu/V125/N35/housinglottery.html&lt;/a&gt;]

In the summer lottery, 70 percent of freshmen received their first choice, 26 percent received their second choice, and the remaining four percent were assigned to their third choice.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Okay, so what if you pulled something ridiculous to stack the housing lottery? Like putting that you were medically allergic to cats but having Senior Haus, EC and Random as your 2nd, 3rd and 4th choices. Or being a white female with Chocolate House as your 2nd choice, or filling 2-4 with cultural houses you know you'd never be accepted to. Think that'd actually work? ;)</p>

<p>It happens every year, as does a discussion about how to stack it for best results. :) But really, just put down your top few choices and you're almost certain to be assigned to one of your top two. And if you aren't, you may be able to change at Rush (or may decide to move somewhere else completely after you meet all the folks you'd be living with in various dorms). Or you may be able to switch in the Readjustment Lottery or at midyear. Or you may find you actually LIKE being where you end up, if it wasn't your original first choice. Or you'll find you don't mind sticking it out where you are until you have a chance to move to a frat or ILG.</p>

<p>It'll all work out, really.</p>

<p>Thank you molliebatmit and mootmom. It made me feel better now.</p>

<p>So when I see "Confirmation of your Preferences," this mean that I am done with my housing lottery, right?</p>

<p>I was worried about this too, but the answer is essentially yes/no. Once you save your preferences, and do the questionnaire, you'll see a screen allowing you to invite someone as your roommate and your choices for housing. You can change this anytime before June 16th. So you are done with your lottery, but it's not submitted until the 16th pretty much.</p>

<p>oh, I see...</p>

<p>So what was your final ranking?</p>

<p>Mine was...</p>

<ol>
<li>Random</li>
<li>MacGregor</li>
<li>Burton-Conner</li>
<li>Baker</li>
<li>East Campus
etc etc</li>
</ol>

<p>...but I really only want to live in the top 3.</p>

<p>keep in mind, if you rank baker or EC that late, you simply won't get it. With that list, you might get Random, otherwise you will get Macgregor. If Random is your first choice you might as well list Baker and EC 2nd and 3rd to promote your 1st choice, is my philosophy</p>

<p>My top three were EC, SH, and Bexley, in that order. Although I'm told that this will probably just land me straight in SH.</p>

<p>Yea, whereas EC, Baker, Simmons or something like that increases your odds of getting in EC, although you have to live with the possibility or Baker/Simmons. Thing is, it isn't normally hard to just switch to SH afterwards anyway</p>

<p>How can you tell the popularity of the various dorms? Is there a page where stats are listed?</p>

<p>word of mouth, basically.</p>

<p>So essentially, the less popular the dorm is the easier to get in??</p>

<p>Yes. The lottery seeks to maximize the happiness of everyone involved (which is to say that it minimizes the rank number of everybody's dorm), so people who put very popular dorms are less likely to get them than to get less popular dorms. It doesn't mean that you won't get into Popular Dorm A, it just means it's less likely than Less Popular Dorm B.</p>

<p>Still, it's impossible to tell which dorms will be popular and which won't -- there are historical numbers (sometimes they publish them in The Tech, so you could search the archives), but they can vary pretty significantly each year. The only way to tell which dorms will be popular this year is by figuring out the preferences of the entire class of 2010.</p>

<p>So...if I listed:</p>

<ol>
<li>EC</li>
<li>Senior Haus</li>
<li>B-C</li>
</ol>

<p>but I really want to be in EC, should I change my 2nd choice to something else? (Is B-C likely to be more popular than Senior?)</p>

<p>just be honest.</p>