<p>While taking my morning constitutional with a friend, she told me about her very recent trips to the U. of Wisconsin and U. Maryland with her son who is a high school senior. (Her son was in the process of making a final choice.)
As they were touring the Wisconsin campus, they happened to run into an acquaintance who asked if they had looked at the "private dorms." My friend had no idea what the woman was talking about. She was told that kids from the NY/NJ metro area often don't use the on campus housing option, but rather choose to live amongst their regional peers in private housing just off-campus which is set up like a dorm. The reasoning is that they will feel "more comfortable" with kids from their home area rather than "the locals." Wisconsin is about 30% OOS from what I have been told. She and her son checked out this "private" option and, indeed, when they asked students they encountered where they were from, the answers were "New York, New Jersey, New York." They also encountered this same housing "segregation" on their visit to U. Maryland. My friend and her son were rather appalled by this. He chose to eliminate both of these schools from consideration. Has anyone else heard of such a thing?</p>
<p>Hmm, not really. I live near U-Md. but I've never really heard of this. Then again that means obviously most of the people I know at CP are from Md and Va. I kind of assumed it was mandantory to live on campus the first year since that's how most schools are. But I don't really know. Housing can't be cheap there although for the DC area it's probably all right. I didn't really think there were so many people from so far north that it would have that much of an effect on anyone if he liked Md anyway. I would think most of the OOS'ers, like in Va, come from PA and DE and NC.</p>
<p>Too bad he eliminated UW- he could have applied to and gotten in the Residence Halls like plenty of others from OOS. I don't understand the OOS students who self segregate by choosing private off campus dorms. I do remember one mother at summer orientation last year talking about how her D would be living close to the sorority she would probably join- a max of 10% are in the Greek system at UW, I wonder what percentage of those are OOS. Most sophomores on live off campus- apartments (but not my 17 yo... we'll see about the following year). The well meaning aquaintance was passing along information about a small minority of OOS students; this shows how running into the wrong person and taking their comments as representative of the whole campus without checking further can spoil an opportunity. I think there are families from NY/NJ who pass along a mythology about the need to stick together, I wish the friend had read my comments on the CC UW site and PM'd me. I know of a NYer whose son will be in the dorms and I think he will enjoy being one of the typical freshmen. The private dorms send everyone a fancy brochure to lure students, if they were that desirable/popular they wouldn't need to advertise as word of mouth would fill them... </p>
<p>The message to New York/New Jersey students- no need to feel any different than any other student, regardless of your (high) family income, you can join the rest of the freshmen in the dorms and enjoy the on campus experience. One reason to choose a particular school is to experience the lifestyle there and to meet the locals.</p>
<p>I've heard of this too, but don't understand why colleges would offer "private" housing in the first place. Is it school-owned or private? I know some colleges offer suites and apartments, but usually for upperclassmen.</p>
<p>We are from LI, NY, and the several kids we know of at UW did not choose the private option. One said he didn't want to limit his peer/living group. An added plus now is that his local WI friends have invited him to their homes when he can't fly home for breaks.</p>
<p>The private dorms have been around awhile, since I was there...They sprang up years ago because you couldn't get in the dorms OOS. I got in because I applied in Oct. The kids I knew that lived in the Towers were not only east coast kids, one of my closest friends lived there from Columbus OH, another from Mpls. I know the same thing exists at Illinois and at Kansas and at neither of those schools is it simply East coast kids. Private dorms exist because of the dorm shortage originally, and then many have a preferance for that type of living</p>
<p>The above (Ispf...) cross posted with my edit. The private dorms have nothing to do with the university. UW does not require anyone to live on campus. Newly admitted students (rolling admissions) get info from Res Halls, and also this group of privately owned dorms with the word "university" in its name. There is a window of opportunity to apply to Res Halls after being admitted, some choose not to and can choose any apartments or other places to live. Now most sophomores and above live in apartments etc; they now reserve 50% of the dorm space for incoming students. It's too bad someone let this influence their whole college choice decision, especially with limited information.</p>
<p>When there was an article in my local (Madison) paper about this recently, they made it sound as if it were a lifestyle choice-for those who prefer and can afford a little more luxury. Or a lot more luxury, compared to the older off campus housing stock, some of which is disappearing as these shiny new high rises dot the university area. </p>
<p>My son is subletting one of these places for the summer...will check it out after he moves in.</p>
<p>Are these private dorms necessary because UW doesnt have enough dorm space for its students or because the universitys dorms are just awful?</p>
<p>Are instate students given preference for the campus dorms?</p>
<p>The two largest universities in our state (NC) each have a large private dorm just off the edge of the campuses. I don't think they are filled by kids from the same region except maybe from NC just because the vast majority of the students are from NC. I hear that many who live there are those who have or plan to go Greek.</p>
<p>These dorms have their own cafeteria in the dorm, their own student parking for cars (making it convenient even for freshman to have a car at school) and I know the one at my S's univ. has an outdoor swimming pool. The brochures they send out have glossy pictures of kids splashing in the pool like it's a resort. Of course it all costs more. S didn't not live there but has visited and said he would not want to live there as it is somewhat segregated from the rest of campus which in his mind was disadvantagious for freshmen.</p>
<p>My son lives in the kind of place you're talking about at the University of Maryland. This one is actually more of an apartment building than a dorm, but it's private yet vaguely connected to the university.</p>
<p>There are indeed a lot of out-of-staters there (you can tell by the license plates in the parking garage), but I think that's a matter of money rather than geographic segregation. The place is more expensive than some of the other off-campus housing options, and out-of-staters in general tend to be on the affluent side (you have to have money in order to pay out-of-state tuition). </p>
<p>But the kids who live in this place are all upperclassmen. Everybody lived in the dorms as freshmen, and I think that's a good idea. Maryland has a lot of special programs for freshmen in which the people in a program live together in the dorms. It's a good way to meet people who share your interests, and it helps to make a huge campus smaller.</p>
<p>These are private, not University owned dorms and as PackMom says, they have their own amenities such as a cafeteria. I sarcastically asked my friend if there was a concierge. The "idea" being spread from year to year is that NY metro students would not feel as comfortable living with all the midwesterners. They would have "nothing in common." She heard this statement from an otherwise "normal" mother. At least she thought the woman was normal before this encounter. By the way, we are from the NY metro area.</p>
<p>One of my good friends lived in this type of housing her freshman year at UIUC. There wasn't much geographic segregation, but she did find it economically and culturally segregated in a way she disliked.</p>
<p>"NY metro students would not feel as comfortable living with all the midwesterners."</p>
<p>LOL! Midwesterners are kinda like aliens, aren't they? ;)</p>
<p>I know a couple of kids starting at College Park this fall but they were only granted 2nd semester admission. They can take classes but cannot live on campus. Both of them will be in a off campus dorm bldg. Unless things have changed there were a couple of motels that CP was using for overflow housing. Some kids loved it, daily maid service, indoor pool, shuttle to campus. They were disappointed when on campus dorm rooms became available.</p>
<p>The big city kids don't want to associate with hicks, and their daddies agree! ;)</p>
<p>Seriously, though, I have found that for many in the NY metro region there is NO world outside of it with which they want to have to rub shoulders. (If they are even vaguely aware of any world outside of it.)</p>
<p>Holy leapin' generalizations!</p>
<p>UMich, where I went, does not have these kinds of dorms. All the frosh are mixed together. I didn't then, and don't now, know of people from the benighted NY metro region who have a problem with that; to this day, I have many Michigander friends from back then.</p>
<p>^ I'm actually kidding, garland. (Sort of.) Having gone to college with the NY crowd myself, and being very much an outsider as an "upstater" (well, not even an upstater, since I wasn't from Westchester - I think they thought I was a farm kid lol), I still remember the overall scorn many kids felt for virtually any place outside NY metro. You can see it here on CC constantly - there is almost no region of the country that isn't "cornfields." Of course it's a generalization - but in too many cases it is palpable - and when I read stories like this I recall vividly the "self segregation" at college.</p>
<p>I guess...but if a kid is choosing to go to the Midwestern school, then by definition s/he's probably not one of the scornful ones.</p>
<p>The cultural unawareness of east coast kids coming to UW is nothing new. When my wife was a freshman at UW in the mid-70s she was asked by virtually every kid from the east that she met for the first time whether she had grown up on a farm. There was mild surprise and even some muted disappointment when she revealed she was a city kid. </p>
<p>The common east coast freshman question most likely to get squeals of laughter from Wisconsin kids, however, is whether you can see across Lake Michigan.</p>
<p>As for the private dorms at Madison they are heavily "coastie," but there are plenty of kids from the east coast who live in the regular school dorms, too.</p>
<p>Well, when i was at UM, everyone asked me to repeat certain words so they could laugh at my accent.</p>
<p>They also pointed out the Great Lakes if I said I missed the ocean.</p>
<p>However, if there really was an ocean near Ann Arbor, I'd probably be living there still. It's my favorite town in the world, full of some of my favorite people.</p>