<p>We have gone ahead and paid the fees to UA. </p>
<p>DS would really like the suite style, but they really are too expensive for us. I would rather he had the extra $$ for travel/spending money.</p>
<p>I was looking at Blount, which seems like a compromise between the suites and the traditional dorms. However, DS felt 4 guys sharing one bathroom would not be too good, so I suggested Burke. Communal baths, but he doesn’t have to clean them.</p>
<p>He has chosen Computer Engineering as his major, may double with math. </p>
<p>He also has orthopedic issues, wears orthotics, so lots of walking is difficult for him. </p>
<p>Is the location of the dorm important? It looks like Blount is close to the engineering buildings? or doesn’t it matter for freshman year? Would Burke be just as good as Blount?</p>
<p>Also, on the housing site, all his “matches” were looking at suite style dorms, the one thing he will not be signing up for, so how will that work if he doesn’t come up with roommates? </p>
<p>If your son does not have a group of roommates, then the pick will be random. I believe tht housing uses the Questionaire to help in the pick.</p>
<p>If you are concerned about walking there is a very good Crimson Ride bus system on campus that students can use. You can download an app and track the buses in real time.</p>
<p>Re Blount: yes, this is near the eng’g classes (most of them he would take).</p>
<p>If there is ANY way to pay for a suite dorm for 1 year only, this might be option - don’t feel that you are stuck paying that huge price difference forever. The advantages are that he may more easily find roommates (as well as future living arrangements the following year), the suites (Riverside in particular) are very near to engineering classes and dining options and the student center (Ferguson), and walking will be minimized. </p>
<p>It can be VERY helpful to have a bike on campus. There is some sort of bike sharing system, but it’s not that expensive to go to Target or WalMart and buy one…or have it shipped to him. He would need to take a few tools for putting it together.</p>
<p>He does have an older mountain bike we could take down with us, just tie to the roof of the SUV. Is there a place to store these at the dorms? </p>
<p>Also, I had him go in and change the profile and add the honor suites. He really wants to stay in one of them, and honestly, compared to his sisters, he is so much easier and cheaper , he deserves it. We will make it work.</p>
<p>Changing the profile on the housing website did bring up some good matches, but he hesitates contacting anyone, thinks it’s just something guys don’t do. How common is it for roommates to choose each other like that? </p>
<p>Oh, and one other thing. I often read how students need to pick an honors dorm their first year or they can’t get into honors later, yet it seems most sophomores move off campus anyway, so is honors housing really all that important? Or do they tend to “flock together”, making it easier to make friends?</p>
<p>@laralei Since they are both the same price, I would recommend the honors suite-style dorms over the non-honors suite-style dorms. While the honors suite-style dorms are a few years older, they are closer to most parts of campus, are maintained just as well, and tend to be a bit quieter. One can have great roommates in either type of dorm. </p>
<p>I also recommend that your son takes the initiative and contacts several potential roommates. If anything, he gets to know more incoming freshmen and might make some friends along the way. I would also suggest finding roommates who do not share all of the same interests, but who would make good roommates, as part of the college experience is meeting people who are different from oneself. It’s important to note that one doesn’t have to be best friends with their roommates, everyone just needs to respect each other and make sure that all of the roommates have a safe and clean room/suite in which to live.</p>
<p>Here’s my suggestion: pick your honors roommates first…then pick your dorm. The dorm doesn’t really matter in terms of honors/non-honors, IMO. Pick on what is the best location for your collective situation (which seems to be proximity to things). My HC S was in a non-honors dorm (Riverside) his first two years with 3 other HC students. This gave me pause at first (as a parent), but he assured me that he wanted to pick location over whether the dorm was honors or not. It worked out great for them for 2 years. Our gang o’ four had one parent/student kind of in-charge of stuff (like actually picking the room, come selection time), and that worked really well. Can’t say enough about how convenient being on the ground floor was for move-in/-out time! ;)</p>
<p>Re kids communicating: I don’t know how the online roommate matching thing works nowadays, but in the past, kids could send messages back and forth to each other (which were seldom read, let alone action-ed). I suggest that any possible roommate match-ups exchange twitter or FB or social media contact names so they can communicate that way, rather than thru the UA Housing system. You can tell a lot more about a person by their pages than you can by the questions they answer on a housing profile, anyway. And, kids seem to be more comfortable communicating via their pages than an official system. (sorry UA Housing!) </p>
<p>Yes, as SEA_tide wisely put it: it is more important to pick roommates who will make good roommates; friendship amongst rommates can come later…or not. Having a safe, respectful environment is what allows roommates to become friends, regardless of their individual interests. Good luck!</p>
<p>laralei: You have lots of time. If it’s anything like the current freshmen, TONS of the girls had roommate situations all sewed up in December. Few of the boys did. Many of the boys waited until much closer to room selection time before taking much action. (aeromom and SEA_tide offer great suggestions above, by the way) Good luck!!</p>
<p>A bike is really useful and there are tons of bike racks all over campus. just remember to register the bike and bring a sturdy lock. Bring the bike to the dorm room during school breaks.</p>
<p>Suite dorm rooms are large enough to house a bike, if needed. Also, Riverside (and not sure which other dorm buildings) has a locked storage closet for the suite, right next to the suite entrance, accessed out in the hallway. Each suite in Riverside has this small storage closet. Useful for empty boxes, and, I suppose, a bike or two could fit in there if there was nothing else (stand it up on end).</p>
<p>DS is in RCE and loves it.They chose it over RCS because of the larger living room area and it has worked out well. I think they usually have a small crowd in there socializing and playing video games. He met one roommate at the SITE program and then they connected with the other two through social media. Interestingly enough, none of the guys ever showed up on his “recommended” list through the housing website. They didn’t have enough things in common to “match” according to the computer, but they all get along very well. </p>
<p>He took his mountain bike, but I don’t think it has ever been down off of the storage rack. When we were down there the last time, it was still hanging in the same spot! </p>
<p>My kid is not the typical Bama honors student you read about on CC (came in with zero AP credits because his private high school did away with AP classes years ago), was originally interested in attending a LAC, had no idea what he wanted to do with his life while he was in high school, etc., so keep that in mind, but he feels his assignment to Blount is what absolutely made his freshman year at Bama. He thanked my husband profusely over Thanksgiving for getting him out of Paty and is really glad now he got closed out of the suites because he loves the social aspects of Blount. (The location is excellent for engineers as well.) Hard to know that he WOULDN’T have been just as happy with either of those other dorm options, but Blount is kind of a special place and his “random” roommates have been a great match. Yes, sharing a bathroom with three other guys leaves much to be desired (and I was shocked to learn my kid is the one who actually cleans it because we NEVER witnessed that here, LOL), but no place is going to be perfect.</p>
<p>He has bad feet too, BTW, but walks EVERYWHERE and doesn’t mind. If your son has serious issues, however, I would make sure the school knows that when making his housing assignment. Get him a doctor’s note if necessary!</p>
<p>My son has also told me the Crimson Ride is VERY unreliable, so a bike might be a good idea for someone for whom a lot of walking is a problem.</p>
<p>The experiences in each dorm are a little different, traditional style (burke, paty and tutwiler) you get very close with the people on your hall, and less cleaning to do. However the suite styles offer more privacy, yet you are responsible for cleaning up after yourself which is where a lot of students drop the ball. It really just depends on your personality.</p>
<p>The buses are pretty reliable once your learn them, and using the app helps a ton. The two gold routes picks up at Presidential/Riverside, and Ridgecrest and can drop you at the engineering quad, ferguson center, down by the strip, and to the quad right in front of where most students have classes. The app for it pulls up the real time location and tells you exactly how long until it gets to your stop so you can plan around it for class. </p>
<p>There are bike racks outside of all the dorms, and most class buildings, or you can store in your room. If you have a bike, make sure you register it with UAPD in case it ever get lost/stolen/confiscated. </p>
<p>Also, housing fills up extremely quick, especially the suite-style. Have a couple back in plans in case you don’t get your first choice.</p>
<p>It is true where you live your first affects housing choices later on. Most upperclassmen live off campus but not all. In order to live in the honors dorm you have to had lived there the year before, and many of them do return since housing scholarship recipients are guaranteed housing on campus. </p>
<p>What is the primary purpose of “honors” dorms, as there are suite style for non-honors as well? Is it to facillitate frienships as these students are likely to be in the same classes?</p>
<p>Apart from honors dorms tending to be a bit quieter and having the occasional honors-themed activities, there isn’t much difference. Honors students at UA come in as many variations as non-honors students. There is no specific type of honors student.</p>
<p>As for the Crimson Ride, it is not run like a typical public bus system. Buses do not run on set schedules, so buses aren’t always equivalently spaced. As many UA students weren’t taught how to use public transit as children, one rides Crimson Ride buses more like school buses, which takes some time getting used to. Drivers don’t start driving as soon as passengers cross the DOT yellow/white safety line, passengers cross in front of the bus, and bus stops are before intersections, not after. Some drivers aren’t used to passengers standing when there are seats available. </p>
<p>laralei The primary purpose of honors dorms is to ensure that top students are interacting with each other. Living in a such a community tends to facilitate a higher level of interaction than if students were on their own since many students start life at UA knowing few if any people at the school. This helps foster students to build relationships so that students work together to aide in studying and group learning. Distance tends to be a barrier to doing joint activities including study groups, so students housed in the same dorms eliminates the distance barrier. It also helps foster friendly competition to do well in school. </p>
, he deserves it. We will make it work.</p>