Housing Question and Answer Board

If anyone has any questions about Housing at Ohio State this year, post them here and I can answer them for you! I know the system has changed a lot this year so it can be confusing, hopefully I can help to sort it out! So, questions about room selection, specific residence halls or anything else this is the place.

Is it true we will not be able to request specific dorms we would like this year? Only general areas on campus (North, south, etc.)?

How does choosing housing work if a student is in an honors or scholars program?

@Itzabouttyme Yes it is true for incoming freshmen that you will only be able to pick area, and room rate ( so the price of the room basically)

@Penguins42 Honors and Scholars work a little differently. Scholars- you already have the residence hall you will be living in. So you can put down the area and room rate of that space. But really your preferences don’t matter because you will be living with your scholars group.

If you’re in honors, there are 3 honors residence halls on campus. One on south, one on north, and one on west campus. So putting the area would determine which honors hall you would want to be in.

I’ll be in Blackburn as a Business Scholars. I noticed some of the rooms are “suites” with its own bathroom while others are a typical double room with hallway bath. As a freshman, can I get a suite? How do I request one? Do they combined freshman and sophomores in same floor or is there such a thing as a freshman floor?

Only upperclassmen (sophomores) are allowed to live in the suites, no freshmen. For the business scholars floor, almost all of the doubles will be freshmen and then the suites at the end of the hall will be sophomores who may or may not be in business scholars.

@lab99

My D has been accepted into a Scholars program where freshmen are required to live in Morrill Tower.

I’ve reviewed the online photos and floor plans for Morrill Tower. Let’s just say that they leave a lot to be desired. The layouts of the living spaces are…odd. Specifically they are oddly shaped, and they don’t appear to be conducive to studying (desks side by side w/o room to move them?) or practical (one conjoined dresser unit for two people?).

Disclaimer: I’m an old school parent who does not believe that my D needs lots of bells and whistles and the latest creature comforts in her dorm living space. I’m fine with communal bathrooms and other older features, i.e. I’m not a high maintenance parent.

I’d love to hear from anyone who lives in Morrill Tower (or has lived there) regarding the living experience.

TIA!

@GAHomeschooler To begin I just wanted to say congratulations to your D on her acceptance!

I have lived on all 3 areas of campus, so I sort of have the positives and negatives of them all. But when I was on west campus, I did live in Morrill tower. The layout is a little odd, but I would say the best part of the room design is having separate sleeping and study spaces. I could study while my roommate was sleeping or vice versa without getting in their way. The desks are connected to the wall, but they really wouldn’t fit anywhere else anyway due to the layout of the room. The best part about the desks are the huge cubbies above them (which you should be able to see if you do the 360 degree room tour located on the OSU Housing website if you haven’t already).

For the storage for students: Each student in a quad gets their own closet. There are 8 large drawers in the dressers so in a double each student would get 4, and in a quad each student gets 2 of them.

Living in a double in Morrill actually gives you some of the most space per student than other residence halls on campus. You basically get 2 closets and the size of 2 desks to yourself. Living in a quad makes it a little tighter, but I know some people that loved it as well, and having the separate sleeping and studying spaces are a must for this as well.

Finally, what I would say is the best part of Morrill is the community. The way it’s laid out, you have a common area in each suite which is an area that connects 4 bedrooms together. I have never seen a community that lends to new friendships and collaboration than Morrill does.

Hopefully that answered some of your questions! If you have any other questions please don’t hesitate to ask!

@osustudent136, Thanks for the reply! It’s appreciated. Hopefully my D will get a double (if she selects Ohio State )!

I have a few follow-up questions:

  1. What, if any, are the cons of living on West campus?
  2. My D would be enrolled in the CFAES. How far is Morrill from the general science (biology, chemistry etc.) and the animal science classes?
  3. I know that Morrill has its own cafeteria, how far/near are other eating options?

Thanks!

@GAHomeschooler No problem at all!

  1. The cons of West campus I would say would be being farther from academic campus and if she were to be placed in a quad that would be less space than a double but not necessarily more space that a freshman would have anywhere else on campus.
  2. Morrill would be the closest residence hall we have to the animal science classes on ag campus, and is a little bit farther from the general science classes but no more than 10-15 minutes of a walk, and even less if she can catch a bus which picks up really close to Morrill.
  3. Morrill does have its own cafeteria which is a big plus, as well as a convenience store and a grab and go place as well. Having food in the residence hall is really rare and almost non-existant on campus so that is a big positive for Morrill as well.

@GAHomeschooler Just as a follow-up, when your student comes to campus for orientation this summer she will have the chance to stay the night in Morrill tower (that is where all orientation students stay) and she could see exactly what her room would look like!

My son stayed in Morrill for his orientation. I found the dorm to be very old and dated and after seeing it was really hoping my son wouldn’t end up there. He didn’t, he got a double in a new dorm on North Campus. That being said he became friends with another freshman in Morrill. My son thought that the social atmosphere of his friend’s floor on Morrill was significantly better than what he experienced in his north campus dorm. And it was so close to the football stadium which is a clear bonus during the fall. So just noting that to say that regardless of where your child ends up they hopefully will find something about their dorm that they like and that is better than what they might experience elsewhere.

Is there anything that more special about a rate 1 vs a rate 2 room? I am willing to spend $600 more dollars if it is truly worth it, but if it is not much different than I would prefer to save it for next year’s tuition…

I believe most of the triples and quads are rate II except the suites in the newer buildings are rate I. Doubles that are rate II tend to be in the older buildings. You can go to the housing website and look up different buildings. On those pages you can see which rooms are designated to which rate and see a sample floor plan with dimensions.

I didn’t see on the housing website page where the dorms have corresponding rates. Wondering what the South dorms are- Smith Steeb, Park Stradley and Siebert?
Also, what are the Facebook pages for the students to join?
Lastly, do North and South have different traits? I know it’s arbitrary but heard South is more for partners and North more academic? Thanks!

@schmoozie @BuckeyeNut13

Try this link. Click into each individual dorm. If you scroll down to where it lists individual room numbers at the top of each list there is the room rate. At the bottom of each list you can click into a sample floorplan.

https://housing.osu.edu/roomsearch/

Park Stradley, Smith Steeb and Seibert are all rate one as they are newer in that they have all. Even completely remodeled in the last few years.

North and South used to have the identity as you described however since the new north dorms have opened that has changed. There doesn’t seem to be any specific identity anymore.

Typically all the rooms in the newest dorms regardless of type are Rate 1. After that, generally speaking singles in older dorms are rate 1, doubles in older dorms are rate 2 and triples or quads are rate 3. So if you want to be in a newer dorm or have a single (which are typically very difficult for freshmen to get) you need to be willing to pay Rate 1.

Honestly, there really aren’t any decent rooms that aren’t Rate 1. Everything Rate 2 and 3 are various degrees of awful. For what it’s worth, I don’t know a single rising sophomore that didn’t select a rate 1 room for next year.

As for the North / South divide, I do believe it still somewhat holds, but it’s obviously a huge generalization​. The new dorms in particular buck the trend because of all the doubles (Suites/quads seem to be inherently less social)

Question: I see that “4/room with bath & a/c-North” listed under both the Room rate 1 and Room rate 2 tiers. Also, I’ve recently read that housing for freshmen is in “quads” more than in other arrangements due to demand.

So what is the difference in the 4/room for the different room rates in North campus? If we select rate 1, it is because we’d pay more for a double - but if he gets put in a quad regardless, what would the higher tier buy him? Bigger Room? Newer room?

Thanks.