I will be a freshman this coming fall at Cornell. I want to get a single, but how likely is it that I would get one?
I filled out single as my first preference on the housing application. I put “residence hall” as my first building preference. Should I put Balch/all-women’s housing as my second preference if i really want a single? I would prefer to be in a single in a co-ed dorm, but I don’t know how common that is or if it will happen.
Nevertheless, if i don’t put Balch as one of my building preferences, could I still be put in Balch with a single rather than a co-ed dorm with a roommate?
Singles are actually easy to get. It seems they have more singles than are requested (probably because they are more expensive and a lot of freshmen want roomies for social reasons). My D is a freshman now. She requested a double in a regular residence hall but they gave her a single. She was kind of surprised, but ended up really liking it. She has 6 suitemates sharing a bathroom, so she’s not isolated or anything. If you select “single” as your first choice, I think you’ll have a good chance of getting that.
@Renomamma Thanks! Do you remember if your daughter submitted her housing form early/on time? So she got a single in a co-ed dorm, right? That sounds really nice - the suite. And so do you think I should just leave my only building preference for a residential/co-ed dorm?
She submitted it on time, I don’t recall if she was early. That’s totally up to you. I think that’s what she did (I can’t remember for sure). She is in one of the highrises. It’s an older dorm, a bit funky, but it’s more about the social contacts you make. She did NOT select Balch because she did not want an all female dorm, and it sounds like not many students pick that dorm first choice, so many end up there when they didn’t select it anyway. It’s actually a pretty building. Most people end up happy where they end up. Try to keep an open mind. It’s an exciting time! Best of luck.
Yay CU’19 @Coriander23 - what housing preferences did you put/are you going to put? Since you also want a single. Also, is there any way to push for getting a single in a suite?
I should add that a lot of people don’t get their preferences, but most people end up happy with what they get. It’s more about all the people you’ll meet Keep an open mind.
Balch has a lot of singles and it’s not very popular because it’s single-sex. My daughter requested a Balch single because she wanted the single, not because she wanted to be in Balch. She got what she wanted and was very pleased.
Regarding Balch - all of the singles share a “sink room” with another single (so it’s kind of like a 2-person suite) and tend to be HUGE. Sink + huge + proximity to campus are pretty big positives for Balch. So I would recommend it, as long as you are ok with a year of non co-ed. Also it’s the only way you can know for sure which dorm you will be in. You can always tell people you were randomly assigned there
More re Balch: It’s not a nunnery. As with any other dorm, you can bring in guests of either gender, and if you have one of the many singles, no one is going to care if your guest stays overnight on occasion. There are even some bathrooms that are designated co-ed (to accommodate male guests without decreasing the number of bathrooms available to the residents).
Just curious. Are coed residence halls coed by floor or by coed by room? At some schools it’s coed bathroom too. Is this the case at Cornell or are there male/female bathrooms?
It all depends on the dorm. For the freshmen dorms, the larger ones usually have a male section and a female section on each floor with separate bathrooms. Some of the west campus dorms do have a few co-ed bathrooms, but they are far and few and there are separate ones nearby.
The only co-ed bathrooms I know of are in Balch, where they exist so that male guests have a place to go to the bathroom. But there are plenty of other bathrooms available, and those women who don’t want to use a co-ed bathroom don’t have to.
On co-ed bathrooms, there are some in the freshman dorms like Donlon, etc. Each bathroom will usually have an informal designation on whether it’s co-ed or not and most buildings have a mix (exceptions being places like the Low Rises which have suite bathrooms and each suite tends to be single sex).
On singles, you should be able to get a single as some of the program houses often have empty rooms to fill still.
Risley also has co-ed bathrooms and co-ed floors. There are some single sex floors, too, I believe. Plenty of singles there, too. My son has had one for three years and will be there for his senior year.
@cornellian19 Yes to the first question. And nothing can really be guaranteed to the second question. I’m not sure off the top of my head which freshmen dorms even have “super singles.” I know there are for sophomores and up living on west.
I’ve only heard “super single” used in reference to doubles where the roommate isn’t there and the housing office fails to fill the spot in (I had one sophomore year as my roommate ended up taking a sabbatical). For those, there’s no way to ensure you’ll get one.
Keep an open mind.