<p>I assume that students use their cell phones as their primary phone number. But do the dorm rooms have phone service? If so, do the rooms come with phones or do you need to bring your own? When do you find out the phone number for your dorm room? If you live in a double, do you have one or two phone lines in the room?</p>
<p>I just looked at this info yesterday on the over in guide in RPS. That gives pretty good details. The dorms do have a phone hookup, though some dorms you have to request activation. One per room, but I believe another lube is avail in certain dorms. You have to bring your own phone. Not sure of when you get number, but I would guess on move in.</p>
<p>Sorry for all those typos (mobile) … I meant another line is available</p>
<p>You really don’t want a phone. Several of my dorm neighbors had them and they’d get wrong number calls at all hours of the day and night, or people looking for people who lived there last year, telemarketers, etc. etc.</p>
<p>Thanks mama1317 for pointing me to the RPS move-in guide. I didn’t see that before, and it has lots of good info. And thanks soccurgurl7988 for sharing your experience. My concern is that I’ve heard some dorms (Foster) have terrible cell phone reception, and I want to be able to communicate with my daughter! She will be living in Foster for 2 weeks for IFS and then moving to McNutt. Any comment on cell phone reception in those two dorms? We have AT&T.</p>
<p>You could let her spend a couple of weeks there and see how the reception is. Likely she will call you from other places anyway (my D always called when she was walking to or from class or the library or whatever). Pretty much never from in her dorm. So she was always a little out of breath. 
Really, almost NO students have land phones anymore…</p>
<p>The land line phone at IU is free. You can call your daughter’s land line and not have to worry about cell phone’s reception if the cell phone reception is weak in her room.</p>
<p>Stbemptynest, my DD will also be going to IFS, it’s coming fast! Soccergurl7988 that is a good consideration, the compromise is only having the ringer on during preplanned times or not at all, so it still is available. This continues to be a generational thing, landlines still have a important role and are much more reliable in an emergency, especially a national one, which don’t come with warnings. But your reservation is understood. Thankfully a landline phone handset is cheap!</p>
<p>She should be fine. Some buildings on campus do have poor reception–lecture halls in Ballantine, basement in Swain/Jordan/Woodburn, some rooms in Kelley, etc. But to be honest, she’s going to be so busy during IFS, both with making friends and the class itself, that she won’t have much time to chat. I think you’ll be fine without sending a landline phone with her, because she’ll probably send it right back with you when you come down the first time! </p>
<p>Word to the wise–cell phone reception during football games and basketball games in the stadium areas is poor to nonexistent. So don’t bother trying to get in touch with your kids during those times…not that you’d want to :)</p>