<p>With graduation coming up and my son's 18th birthday conveniently, folks are asking for ideas. He got a fridge and small microwave for his birthday (based on USC guidelines). His roommate is bringing the TV. He got some other usuals for Christmas- small rug, desk lamp, floor lamp, bedding. So...aside from those items...</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Is a small printer of any use in your dorm room? I realize they have printers on campus but I'm just thinking for convenience... or do they typically not print much these days? :-)</p></li>
<li><p>What else have you (current students) found useful for your dorm, or what do you wish you had that you didn't think about initially? I've seen the exhaustive list, which is helpful.. but anything that stands out? </p></li>
</ul>
<p>In my day, our most used item was our "hot pot" for ramen noodles and beanie weenies but clearly they don't allow those anymore!</p>
<p>Febreze! Although that’s not much of grad gift. Our D does have printer and it does get used…never uses campus wide printers. As freshmen we treated printer like share object and we bought one and set it up to use with printer cable and she and roommate shared, just to save space. D mostly prints drafts of papers - some teachers want them submitted online but some still ask for hard copy - and readings/notes that teachers post. She’s not much for reading stuff on-line. Probably could wait on that until you see how much he uses it.</p>
<p>If lofting bed, some type of clip-on shelf is nice to keep phone on (or whatever he uses as alarm). Maybe for gift, put $ on Carolina card earmarked for him to buy some USC clothing when he gets there. The official underarmour stuff is nice but definitely expensive enough to fall into the nice gift category.</p>
<p>For dorm again…command strips!!! I have girls so we did all the curtains and cute message boards and calendars but guys maybe not so much into that.</p>
<p>Also for gift ideas… gift cards to use for change of pace. Barnes &noble runs bookstore so GC from there is good for USC clothing and the cafe there. Note that on campus food chains don’t take GC (chic fil a, Starbucks). If walking, ideas are Moe’s across from honor dorm, chick fil a, cook out, starbucks and qudobo in 5 points, and five guys and mellow mushroom in vista. Fun to be able to eat off campus sometime!</p>
<p>You can survive without a printer! There are printing kiosks all around campus that costs 10 cents a page that work dandy. </p>
<p>A gaming system could be fun if either one of you have one. My buddies and I enjoy playing gamecube a lot on the floor. A mini vacuum would be very helpful. People are always borrowing mine, the floor gets nasty. I will be definitely bringing myself a mini iron in the fall, wish I had one for this year.</p>
<p>If you decide and invest in a loft, they create so much space in the dorm room. The best rooms on my floor had lofted beds with a futon under the bed. </p>
<p>I enjoyed having pictures from home, and the walls are BARREN. Bring some things to liven them up. I brought some posters and gamecock things, but 4 x 6 foot flags came in really handy! I have a gamecock one and a state SC flag. </p>
<p>You will learn more about this at orientation! (Sign up for the earliest time possible)</p>
<p>^I disagree. I’d bring a printer. It’s always a hassle when I have to go to the library to print something out and it adds up after a while. Some classes require pages and pages of print outs. Astronomy requires eery lab page to be printed out with your name… so that’s about 10-15 pages per lab and there are six required labs for Astronomy 111. A lot of my teachers ask for syllabi to be printed out and brought to class the first week. Others want papers. It really adds up and 10 cents a pop can get you if you’re not planning for it.</p>
<p>Posters are a good option. I agree about cleaning supplies. Vacuums and irons are very useful. I had one friend who used his iron for a grilled cheese!</p>
<p>Carolina items are a good option as well. T-shirts, hoodies, hats, etc.</p>
<p>As far as posters go, not to far into the fall there is a huge poster sale at Russell House with lots of neat, not too expensive posters. It’s where my D filled in some wall space.</p>
<p>I’m finishing up my first year, and I brought a printer. It was by far the best decision I made while packing; the print kiosk in the dorm rarely worked, and printing in my room definitely beat walking to library at 1 AM. </p>
<p>My roommate brought his Xbox, and I definitely recommend against it. He wasted an amazing amount of time every day and the crowd noise just got on my nerves.</p>
<p>My dorm comes with lofts, and I don’t know what I would do without it. If it didn’t come with the room, I would have certainly bought one. My desk, dresser, and nightstand are all under my bed and it saves so much space. My roommate didn’t loft his bed and his stuff took up way over half of the room.</p>
<p>There is a Walmart nearby that has the largest selection of Gamecock “stuff” that I have ever seen. Really, stuff in the Cola area is as inexpensive as it is in any part of the country, it might not be a bad idea just to purchase new stuff as the student figures out that he/she needs it.</p>
<p>You will also get some “package deal” offers from a variety of companies in the mail soon. It might not actually save you any money, but they do provide the oversize sheets and stuff like that that you will need in a dorm (the bed’s arn’t normal size in many of the dorms). It’s convienent.</p>
<p>I do agree with USCviaMD. Leave the video games at home. My son’s freshman roommate basically wasted his freshman experience by spending all of his free time in the dorm room playing video games. You might even want to leave the TV at home. If the student feels compelled to watch tv, the friends up the hall will always have one, and there is always a small game-day tv watching party going on somewhere (Gamecocks vs Anyone). There’s way to much going on on campus and all over the city to let that happen.</p>
<p>I stayed in the honors dorm and the lofts came with the room! I don’t know about the rest but I know that a loft isn’t included with every one. </p>
<p>If you don’t bring a TV, at least bring an HDMI cable and an adapter if you have a mac. Movie nights are extremely difficult with more than two people watching a computer screen, and the right connectors make everything run smoothly.</p>
<p>DD will be living in Capstone this fall. She definitely wants a rug to cover the tile floor. What size should we look for and where can we find affordable rugs? Thanks!</p>
<p>The typical floor plan of Capstone shows main part of room is 13’6" x 11’6" so you could do a 5x7 between the beds or 10x12 to cover most of area. In Ds room we used 5x7 and it covered most of what was bare floor in her dorm room. Later in summer you can find a number of simple bound rugs at Bed Bath and Beyond. I found one for older D at local warehouse store. Of course you can find more decorative and more $$ ones at Target etc. There is also a way to buy through some USC thing where rug is delivered to room before you arrive but I’m not sure how happy people have been with that.</p>
<p>Unless the selection isn’t standard, you should be able to buy one at BB&B and have it held here in Columbia if space moving down is an issue.</p>
<p>Last year, you could pre order a rug for the year and they would have it delivered before you moved in. We bought a rug, but it was annoying having to haul it in the car from out of state. </p>
<p>Make sure everyone brings Ethernet cables! If there is one thing us students hate about our campus, it’s the slow wifi. And warn your children if they normally download or torrent things illegally, they can shut down your internet. Fair warning!</p>
<p>Does anyone know if they have a program where u can rent a mini fridge for the year instead of buying one… I know some campuses do. I have an extra one but don’t want to have to take up so much space in the car.</p>
<p>^^Not all of the dorms have ethernet. >_< Learned that the hard way last year. I relied on it in Maxcy, but in my Woodrow apartment, we only had wi-fi. It was the most annoying thing.</p>
<p>If I recall, I remember there not being a mini-fridge rental program. There could be one this year, but I’m pretty sure that there wasn’t my freshman year.</p>
<p>Ok thanks…I haven’t heard anything about there being one so maybe there isn’t. I guess we will wait to find out who d’ s roommate is and decide if we need to bring one with us or not.</p>
<p>We actually have an extra one… The one we have just takes up a lot of room in the car. My older daughters college in va does rent them out so you don’t have to transport it if you live far. I think they rent them for like 100 a year but its worth it to me to not have to deal with getting it there and they just pick it up at the end of the year.</p>
<p>/\ actually the company that rents them also sells them at her school as well. It’s nice though because even if u buy it from them they just have the fridge waiting for you … Just makes the initial trip easier.</p>
Although that’s not much of grad gift. Our D does have printer and it does get used…never uses campus wide printers. As freshmen we treated printer like share object and we bought one and set it up to use with printer cable and she and roommate shared, just to save space. D mostly prints drafts of papers - some teachers want them submitted online but some still ask for hard copy - and readings/notes that teachers post. She’s not much for reading stuff on-line. Probably could wait on that until you see how much he uses it.</p>