Yes, @Periwinkle they stay up to 3-4 am yelling at online gaming friends and take afternoon/late morning classes. I bought him sniper style ear muffs and plugs so he can rest…He does not want me to call the school but HE is planning to meet with them today or tomorrow.
I’d respond, “I don’t see color but apparently you do.”
If things continue to get worse, meet with the teacher & principal and follow everything up with an email to the teacher & principal detailing the conversation and thanking them for addressing the situation in advance.
You need to get it on record that the teacher & principal are very well aware of this situation. Ultimately, this holds the school accountable for future actions.
Agree with others, it is not typical, but there are some kids who are so into gaming/online that they almost seem to forsake the real world. I would advise your S to just keep the door in the suite closed, used his room as a place to sleep only, and seek out friends in other ways (ex. through classes, clubs, club sports etc.). Sorry he walked into a difficult situation.
@DarkStar904, did you post on the wrong thread? 
Students moving into the dorms in the fall may be matched as roommates by interest surveys, or mutual request.
Students moving into the dorms in the spring get whatever is available, often effectively random. The spaces available may be, on average, with roommates more likely to have roommate compatibility issues, since some of the students moved out or changed rooms due to roommate issues. So it would not be surprising if students moving into the dorms in the spring are more likely to have more roommate issues than those moving into the dorms in the fall.
My son is a Junior. In his first year he shared a dorm room with a guy who did not want to talk to him. Last year was in a 4 bedroom apartment on campus. They had a random roommate 1st semester then he graduated and they had another random one second semester. Neither roommate really talked to the other 3 much although the first guys GF kept the common areas clean for all of them. Last summer he was with 3 random guys.I’m not sure if he even talked to them much at all since everyone was busy.Not everyone wants to be friends with their roommates. Also a lot of guys are not the neat and tidy type. Unless it is affecting your sons ability to study and get good grades remember it could be a lot worse. For example they could be drinkers and having parties every night or one of them could be like that guy from a post last semester who had a roommate who was masturbating in front him. I would probably tell my kid to give up on being friends with the roommates, shove some of their food/pots/pan over to claim some kitchen space and seek out friends from other places.
One of D2’s roommates texted her the night before her LSAT (2am) to ask D2 to come out to the living room to lower the shades because she didn’t know how to do it.
She would also text D2 to pick up toilet paper instead getting it herself.
She also left her boots in the only sink they had in the bathroom for two days to soak.
She has a big allowance and budget to order anything she wants online. She likes to leave all of those boxes near a garbage in the apartment, as if someone would come around to throw those boxes out. (D2 piled all of those boxes outside the roommate’s room after she repeatedly refused to throw them out)
Each time D2 had dealt with the roommate each time one of those incidents occurred. According to D2 the situation is better because the roommate is better trained to live with someone now. The parents have done a real disservice to this woman by not teaching her all of those basic manners.
This situation is not typical, but it’s not unusual. It sounds like he’s handling the situation maturely and making the best of a bad situation in order to get through the semester. He’ll undoubtedly make friends who he can room with next year, so look at it as a very temporary situation.
Echo those who feel your S will need to do his best to make do for the time being and to focus on finding social activities/friends outside the dorm.
IMO, it’s unlikely he’ll get them to change at this point considering they’ve been together for at least a semester and trying to get them to clean up will create more enmity between them and your S as their mental/verbal response to that would be along the lines of “Who died and made you dad/king?!! Shove off!!”
A former post-college roommate who was an extreme neatnik in his room recounted having such responses tossed at him when he tried getting more messy roommates to clean common areas of their rented apartment more to his standards*.
- By the time we became acquainted and shared the same apartment after our undergrads, he has accepted the fact it wasn't the best plan to even suggest keeping common areas clean to his high standards....especially considering most of our roommates were medical residents/interns who were rarely home and would be so exhausted from punishingly long work shifts they'd literally go right into their rooms and sleep.
Out of curiosity, did your D2 accommodate that request, ignore it, or even told her to “Figure it out yourself?”
Had an older college friend who tried pulling a variant of that on his post-college roommates because he didn’t know how to do basic household chores tasks like changing lightbulbs.
Said roommates who were already not kindly disposed to him due to his tendency to be argumentative and thinking too highly of himself despite not having the bona-fides to match(placed on academic suspension back in undergrad and not discreet enough to keep that info to himself when not necessary to disclose) responded along the lines of “Hey [name of older college friend], if you were smart enough to be admitted to and graduate from Oberlin, you should be smart enough to figure out how to do it yourself.”
Said older friend felt they were being extremely mean and should have accommodated his request. Had to break it to him that not only was his assessment of the situation completely off the mark…but that he was making a serious imposition on roommates who were already not kindly disposed to him due to his past behavior/actions and further outing himself as someone lacking basic life skills. .
Not typical, but not entirely unusual. It just sounds like they’re anti-social.
You don’t have to be friends with your roommates. He should just make friends outside of his roommates and go from there. He’ll likely only be with them for a few more months.
For what it’s worth, I am a gamer and I know lots of other gamers… none of us are like this. They are probably engrossed in their games because they are anti-social and not the other way around.
I when I moved into a house just off of campus I never talked to my roommate. I just needed a place to live, I wasn’t looking for a friend. We rarely saw each other & would just say hi if we did. This wasn’t the dorms & I wasn’t a freshman so my situation was different. This was a house that had 2 bedrooms that we rented. Her old roommate moved out mid semester & I wanted to leave my housing mid semester. Oh, and I was hardly in any other room besides my bedroom.
I think part of the problem is expectations and ‘idealizing’ the roommate possibilities. With most of S’ friends (he is in a single and it has been the best decision ever - friends with everyone on the floor but has his own space) it seems they are just okay at best. Have yet to hear a story where they hang out together - well, maybe for a few of the girls but not for any of the guys. Also starting mid-year is tough. In the fall everyone is looking to make new friendships and then I’m sure they get a bit lazy about reaching out to new people.
As has been noted and as you agree yourself, it’s not a great situation but not horrible either. Hopefully he can join some clubs or intramurals to make friends. I think this is an important part of being happy at any university so he just needs to focus his efforts outside of his suite.
Sounds like a pretty tough situation. Either your son can just deal with it or talk to the RA and try to move. If he ends up staying, I think he should feel free to clear space in the common room as needed, and toss junk into corners. IMHO people who make huge messes aren’t too picky about where exactly their mess is. “Hey my mess was in that corner and you moved it into that other corner!” - that’s probably not a complaint he’s going to get.
It definitely sounds like he should simply write-off the rommates and seek friends elsewhere. Since he’s into sports he should have no problem finding guys to play pickup basketball and other such things. That’s usually just as simple as walking over to the nearest game and asking if he can get in. Or he can even just find a nearby empty court and start shooting hoops solo, and eventually somebody will come along to join in. There are probably tons of other guys in the dorms into similar things for him to hang out with and I suspect once he gets over the rommate thing, he’ll be more than fine.
It’s not typical. Your son’s roommates are idiots. I’d ask for a transfer or just ride it out through the semester and opt for new roommates next fall. Perhaps he can use the next few months to line something up with normal people.
@DarkStar904 your comment made me chuckle! He has a few friends from high school at the school and they are looking at rooming in the fall.
I think the culture of that suite was already established when he moved in mid semester, so there is little he is going to change either with the mess or the gaming. He should not take it personally as the other 3 are not interacting with each other either - they seem obsessed with the gaming. I would suggest that he look to make connections elsewhere and I am sure that he will. Gamers are a breed of their own, not necessarily negative but their priorities are different than say a more athletic or theater oriented student.
It does not sound like he would be compatible with these guys anyway, so he should just stick it out for the semester and use this semester to cement relationships that will lead to new housing for next Fall. I think the best roommate situation is where you get along with the others but they are not your core social circle.