I have a feeling being “first roommate in room” with the mom of the roommate might not have mattered. Imagine if you moved your child in early, said your goodbyes, and took off assuming your child was in good shape? I could see this mom bulldozing over any 18 year old to get the room decorated the way she pictured it.
You and I think very much alike in this respect.
Funny considering I had a loud heated argument with an aunt over this very issue because she insisted I “needed” a TV in my dormroom when I knew very well I didn’t…not to mention there wasn’t much room in the dorm room anyways.
And yes, not only do students stream stuff on laptops, the current undergrads I knew tend to make it a much more social occasion than the few dormmates I knew who had a TV and ended up isolating themselves in their rooms.
Much more like the dorm movie nights I used to run with another classmate as co-chairs of our dorm’s film committee which was a hit with the dorm than a solitary student watching TV alone in his/her dormroom.
My daughter loves her TV. Kids pile into her room to watch it with her.
Both of my kids had TVs in college and both did very well socially and academically. Non issue for our kids.
In my day (hey, get OFF my lawn!), we piled into the common room to sit in the floor and watch the first few seasons of SNL on the only TV and spill popcorn all over everything. I don’t recall that TV being used for anything else, and I didn’t know anyone with a private TV. Kids these days…
I remember watching SNL in groups, also reruns of “The Prisoner”. With milk and cookies.
In my dorm at Cornell, it was General Hospital every afternoon in the common room. My kids today don’t want tv’s of any kind. Rarely, if they watch something it’s on their laptops.
For those who aren’t fans of spending time decorating a dorm room, come to a Service Academy. My son is at West Point and they are only allowed to hang one thing on their wall - a state flag. And one photo is allowed - no bigger than an 8x10 in a simple frame can be on their desk. That’s it for decoration. They do spend an inordinate amount of time cleaning their rooms when it is inspection time. Literally hours.
A few pages ago, there was talk about how a student at Drew decorated his dorm room and someone wondered why he didn’t live off campus. I live not too far from Drew and there aren’t a lot of off campus housing options near the school. It’s in a fairly suburban area.
@bookreader for freshman year my S brought one pillow and one wall hanging which was a combo chalkboard/picture frame about 7"x14" That’s it!
Move out was pretty easy for him.
His roommate had a TV which he put in the living area but it was used for Nintendo and Xbox
We moved Swimkid into his boarding school dorm this weekend and he refused to let us rearrange ANYTHING! He got there first, claimed a dresser, a closet and the bottom bunk (shoulder surgery prevents him claiming the top bunk for now). He insisted that he was not arranging anything until his roommate showed up later in the afternoon and they could discuss all the possible options. They lived together last year so that explains a lot. Even so, I hope that being in a dorm room for three years will give him the skill set to deal with whatever comes his way when he moves into his college dorm. @SevenDad They are on 3rd floor Vorhees near the library at SAS. Tiny room with a dormer ; )
D1 and D2’s schools had dorm rooms decorated to the hilt. EVERY single room on their respective floors had big screen TVs. Common rooms were never used. D2’s university had beautiful furnished on campus apartments with floor to ceiling windows overlooking sports fields and city skyline and underground parking for upper class students. Each school has its own culture.
This thread with its title and the original post are worthy to be added to CC Hall of Fame. 
Hope @SuburbMom’s daughter is having a great week at her college and making new friends!
A couple year’s ago a friend’s daughter got a letter from her small, LAC stating move in rules. NO furniture was to be moved until all roommates were present. Nothing was to be unpacked until all roommates were present. No art work, carpets, anything installed until all roommates were present. Parents were welcome, but were expected to leave all decisions up to the students. RA’s served as judge and jury ( and most really enjoyed it!) RA’s could “disallow” extra furniture, excess boxes, and “extraneous persons” from the room. Early move in was available only for a few athletes and they were assigned a temporary room in another dorm and had to move all their stuff on move-in day to their new dorm rooms. If your roommate was late, you had to sit and wait. One girl on her floor roommate was three days late due to a family funeral. The RA’s allowed her to make a bed, and unpack into one dresser, but when the roommate showed up, the RA’s came in to make sure everything was divided up equally. She said everything went really well,most everybody played along (it helped that one of the RA’s came dressed in robe and carried a big gavel). The only girl who really complained, and whose parents complained turned out to be the girl who annoyed every one all year., so that figures.
^I think that policy is overly restrictive in the other direction. To wait 3 days or have athletes go through 2 moves seems like it creates unnecessary hurdles when, honestly, I think most students are reasonable and cooperative, and act like the young adults as they should be treated. The policy above seems too heavy handed, IMO. I think my kids would roll their eyes at the gavel and robe bit. Why approach it assuming there will be trouble instead of just dealing with trouble when it arises. I could see a statement suggesting cooperation/fairness/working together but that’s about it. :-??
agree (maybe first time) with @doschicos. For the most part, life is unfair. Best to start just getting used to it. First come, first served.
and I should add, this is a good place to start advocating for one’s self and working things out with others who don’t see things the way you do
But I don’t agree or advocate what @preppedparent is espousing: “first come, first served”. Maybe we don’t agree here after all. 
I recommend fairness and flexibility whether you are first or not. You get there first, sure, set up your stuff, but do it in a fair way. Don’t grab all the best stuff if there is a difference in stuff, or more than your share. Be flexible and willing to either make accommodations right away or agree to switch off for the second semester. Compromise. Make things as fair as possible. For most people, this doesn’t require RA involvement.
@doschicos ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^Like like a 1000x like
Waiting 3 days seems extreme, but waiting an hour or two doesn’t. My kids were assigned specific move-in times based on their floor (top down), to help with parking, elevator use and so on. 4th floor movein was 9-11 or whatever.
Roomie isn’t there by 11, OK, pick a side. Obviously don’t hog things like in OP here, but you should only have to wait so long.
D’s school also had a detailed roommate agreement. It was a living document that they answered questions on - “how will we handle x, how about y” and so on, not just something they signed.