Question Concerning Dorm Assignments

@fbsdreams North is about 52% singles, 11% suites with single rooms for 4 people plus a common area, and 37% doubles. However, first years have no chance of getting a suite.

@HydeSnark Did you compute by rooms or beds?

@exacademic Rooms, not beds. Here are the floor plans of an “average house”, if you’re interested: http://d3qi0qp55mx5f5.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/housing/docs/Campus_North_1.pdf

Thanks! I’d used that floorplan and gotten significantly different numbers, but I used beds. 42 kids live in doubles, 24 in apartments, and 29 in singles. Not counting RAs.

It’s entirely possible I counted wrong.

Rooms vs beds accounts for it, I think. We just counted different things (and I didn’t convert to percentages). Bottom line, though, is if you’re a first year with no shot at an apartment, then, odds are that you’d end up in a double rather than a single.

@HydeSnark My son indicated that he preferred North as first preference and single as his second. Based on your post #20 and previous comments, this means he should end up at North in either a single or a double?

@fbsdreams Probably yes. Chances of a single depend on how many people currently in North stay in housing, and how many people who stay in housing go for a single.

Last year North had a ton of space. It was physically bigger than the satellites and they didn’t let any current students transfer in - you could only get a spot in North if you were in a satellite that was moving. Lots of people in satellites didn’t even WANT to move and forfeited their spot to move off campus. This means that North has a huge proportion of first years this year, and something like half the class of 2020 lives in North. Despite how many open spaces it had for first years, it is at 100% capacity now.

However, the majority of 2020ers are probably going to stay next year and they are probably going to take singles before doubles.

So I think 2021ers chances of getting into North will be significantly lower than last year, and their chances of getting singles will be nearly 0, even though 2020ers got into North fairly easily and many of them managed to get singles.

2022ers will be in luck though - 2020s will be third years and many of them will be moving off campus. The low amount of 2021ers won’t be able to take all the singles as second years. This is how housing works, in general. It ebbs and flows depending on the year.

@HydeSnark Thanks for the thorough response.

Somewhat off subject, but with regards to first year and cars, do they need to apply for a permit as early as possible and would they park in the garage by North ?

@fbsdreams I have no idea how that works. I don’t have a car and neither does anyone I know. I couldn’t even tell you who to ask :\ Sorry

Having a car at Chicago will be really expensive, and only intermittently useful. Each of my kids had a friend or two who was local and had access to a family car, and they also joined what is now Enterprise Carshare, and that seemed to work well enough for the few times a year a car was really a good idea. Enterprise is on campus, and undergraduates can join even if they are not old enough to rent a car on their own. Those options, and of course public transportation and Uber, wind up costing a lot less than parking a car, whether in Hyde Park at discounted rates or elsewhere around the city, not to mention what the insurance company will charge you if they know the car is in Chicago most of the year.

One of my kids has lived in Chicago continuously since 2007. He lived in Hyde Park throughout his undergraduate years, and since graduating he has lived elsewhere but worked at the university all but two years. He has never owned a car, or wanted to.

@HydeSnark @JHS thanks for the information. While we visited I thought he wouldn’t want the hassle of having a car on campus.

As you could imagine, he had different based on his current usage. I’ll be sure to steer him towards this.

@fbsdreams do you live in the suburbs? He may just not realize he won’t need one

^Agree, a car would be a pain at UChicago. It’s not like he’s commuting.

What does the enrollment fee entitle you to for housing - essentially a spot in the queue? In other words, once fee is paid and housing preferences specified, is my daughter free to change her mind w/r/t dorm selection up to a certain point (June first?) ? She is visiting during the overnight in early April and will look at the dorms in detail at that time. She really has no clue at this point as to what she’d prefer so I’m hoping she isn’t stuck in some choice w/o having had the chance to at lease see it for reals first.

@JBStillFlying Yup, paying essentially guarantees you a spot in the queue. The faster you pay the more likely you are to get the dorm of your choice.

@JBStillFlying she can change her preference until much later, she is not bound to her initial preference. She will maintain her position in the queue even if she changes her preference.

I believe students can change until June 1st. Once the deposit is made, she is in queue. The earlier the better.

OK thanks guys. She’ll enroll this morning. Looking at the choices last night and love the variety.

You probably will have a hard time to look around different dorms during admit weekends except your host dorm. There is no model house in the dorms you can visit nor can you enter the building without security card. For the housing you are almost on your own to figure out unless the College has changed its policy recently.