<p>It seems that at my son's school (Harvard), they do not assign the student a specific room or roomate, but just the suite with 3 or 5 others. The kids then decide amongst themselves who will room with whom, and how the rooms will be distributed (eg. having a common room or rotating singles, etc.) Also, it's recommended that they don't decide this immediately in some random way, but rather wait a day or two to get to know one another, so roomates can be selected based on some sense of compatability. </p>
<p>So....this means that as a Mom, I will be denied the time honored task of helping my son get settled-- making up his bed, helping organize his stuff, etc. There will likely be no sense of satisfaction in having him be "tucked in" to his new space when we leave. As a somewhat overinvolved parent who is having enough trouble with this milestone (empty nested at this point, too!), this concept is making me uneasy. I think its kind of consistent with the culture of this school (kids are very independent, not coddled, etc.), and I can see the positive side of it--maybe a better chance of a good roomate situation, but just leaving him there with all his boxes is going to be really tough. Anyway, is this unique to H., or are there other schools that handle room assignments this way?</p>
<p>This reminds me of what I did to my dad when he took me up to college.</p>
<p>We got to the dorm and within minutes I was in discussions with all these new kids, the RAs, etc. I sort of looked back at my dad and said "bye" or something like that.</p>
<p>He drove me 5 hours, and I basically flipped him off the minute I got there.</p>
<p>This was very much in my thoughts when child#1 went off to college last year.</p>
<p>While I respect my oldest S's independence and ability to make decisions for himself, I have great experience with how he organized his room and his tendency to put off the mundane things in life. I don't have to worry about him doing his class work. Making a bed or doing laundry are at great risk, however. </p>
<p>I'd have been worried that if we hadn't got him off to a good start on his dorm room, he'd be living out of suitcases and boxes until November.</p>
<p>I wouldn't have been too surprised if our S had been more like you, monydad. He's more than ready. Parent's day at orientation was yesterday and he was a little too polite to go off with his roommate and leave his parents to explore the campus alone. It was a close thing.</p>
<p>He did call at 7:45 this morning to demand to know why we hadn't let him know we got home OK, though.</p>
<p>The MIT process is different, but similarly inconclusive for parents, so much so that I'm not going to bother going with him to Orientation. In the MIT model, students are sent DVDs made by students in all N dorms over the summer and are asked to rank them all in order of preference. In late July they are assigned a "temporary room" in a "temporary dorm". The attempt is made to maximize the number of students who are assigned to a dorm they've ranked high on their list (I think this year everyone was assigned to one of their top 3 choices). Orientation begins this coming Sat. During the first few days, all students live in their temp rooms but are cautioned not to unpack anything. They are expected to participate in a "dorm rush" where everyone visits the dorms to see if they feel comfortable with their choice, and all the dorms put on events and feeds in an attempt to show their character to prospective dorm-mate freshmen. At the end of this rush, students rank I think their top several dorms all over again (the "housing readjustment lottery"), and there is another round of assigning them to dorms. (Supposedly one will not be placed anywhere lower in this list than their temp dorm, so if they put their temp dorm at #1, they're supposed to be able to stay there; if it's at #3, they might end up in any of their top 3.) THEN, after everyone is assigned to a dorm, upperclassmen in each dorm do the actual room assignments. Supposedly one will not be left in one's temp room, so as to discourage complacency during the dorm rush: no assuming that it's easier to just stay put in the room you were temped in, 'cause you won't get to stay in that room anyway.</p>
<p>SOOOOOO, that's a long way of saying the students live in a temp room and then move a week after the parents have left. Absolutely no chance to get parental "I see the room all fixed up and ready" satisfaction from that process :) but perhaps a better way to find a likely good fit in a dorm for the first year. We shall see.</p>
<p>IMO, you are going to embarrass the bejesus out of your son if "mom" tries to help decorate and arrange his room.</p>
<p>Imagine if you mother-in-law visited you and your hubby when you moved into your first apartment and had all kinds of ideas about what should go where. Same thing, only worse for a guy trying to connect on a guy level with his roommates.</p>
<p>I think that we parents need to keep a very low profile moving our kids' stuff into a dorm room. Help carry. Maybe assemble a lamp or something, but let them be young adults.</p>
<p>I guess we each have our own relationships with our children/parents, since I can't imagine either of my kids saying what barrons said above. I don't want to arrange or decorate my sons's rooms, but it would be nice to stand in their rooms and remember the feeling of being there, imagining them living the next stage of their lives there. I don't expect to have this desire in the future, but for this first transition out of my home, it would be nice closure for me. Maybe you have to be a parent to understand this urge. </p>
<p>If one of my sons said "If my mom set foot in my room it would be over my dead body," I would be seriously disappointed in the turn our relationship had taken.</p>
<p>When my D arrived at Yale 3 years ago, she was assigned a suite and a roommate. The girls were also assigned to specific rooms within the suite. The common room was their "living room." D received her roommate's name a few weeks before arrival and spoke with her. She also received the names and addresses of her suite-mates. </p>
<p>This year as an RA she was assigned a suite and she and her suite-mate decided rooms with the flip of a coin.</p>
<p>I wouldn't like Harvard's method either...but then again, I am just a tad biased!</p>
<p>Monydad--you sound just like my S#2! In this case, his dad dropped him off. I went to parents weekend though and was pleasantly surprised at his socialness. . . perhaps enough time had passed by then for him to not be absolutely mortified by a visit from Mom. . .</p>
<p>Interesteddad: please don't misunderstand---decorating was never part of the plan (my son hasn't gotten a single poster yet...I'm sure he'll evolve all of that over time. It's more the assembly of the bed (if I leave it to him, the egg crate will end up on top!), and a bit of unpacking of large stuff, maybe helping wipe out the drawers before the clothes go in. When my daughter went to Brown 5 years ago, I think we were able to walk the line between helping her get a bit settled in and giving her space to work things out with her roomate later. This time, no such luck.</p>
<p>Mootmom: what a complex, amazing process at MIT! Sounds like they really go to extra effort to give kids input that leads to satisfaction with their living situation. And I agree with you, I'd be crushed if my son ousted me entirely from his room. Still, I have to admit, my son does think that the Harvard system is "totally cool"</p>
<p>Mootmom, I like your description of how MIT dorm assignments go, but I really feel you should mention that different dorms cost different amounts. My son's dorm is one of the cheapest, but kids can build lofts, paint, do murals (etc.), and can--if they choose--stay in the same room all four years. My son stayed in his first room for two years and anticipates staying in his new room this year AND next (as well as next summer). </p>
<p>Some dorms have communal dining rooms, others encourage cooking in the floor kitchen... there's a wealth of choices. The dorms have significantly different personalities, as well. (There's even a dorm floor that's known for its group expertise with pyrotechnics.)</p>
<p>Barrons...tell us you didn't mean that crack about letting your mother in only over your dead body! At the time I was most "anti-mom" myself (at age 15), I wouldn't have kept her out of my room...and if my S felt that way about me I'd be crushed. </p>
<p>You folks who can't help settle your kids in their dorms rooms (to whatever extent your kids and you mutually want), you have my sympathy...for various reasons, I was denied the college visits I wanted so badly to take my S to...I can relate to that feeling of losing the opportunity to participate in an important rite of passage...</p>
<p>Fortunately, both my S and his roommate were fine w/us (me and roommate's family) emptying the odd suitcase, making the bed, whatever...and meeting each other...reading what Barrons has to say makes me feel like I'm lucky indeed to have the S I have...</p>
<p>monydad: my mother LOVES to tell the story of when she took me to college (and I absolutely cringe when she tells it). She says that when we got all the stuff up to the room, I just looked her and said "well, now you can't tell me what to do anymore." I don't remember saying that but I'm guessing I did based on the way the words are seared into my mother's brain. I would be so upset if either of my kids said that to me but luckily neither of them have grown up in the supremely dysfunctional household that I grew up in which would give them cause in the first place to utter such scornful words.</p>
<p>I took my daughter to school yesterday for soph year. We walked into her room for the first time, turned to each other and almost simulatenously said the same thing: "oh my god, look at those TWO huge closets!!" Shopaholics unite!</p>
<p>Luckily for me she let me stick around and actually asked for my advice on how to set up the bed and desk, where to put the floor lamp and shelves, etc. It made me feel so good. When the basic bones were in order she pretty much kicked me out ("I can take it from here, mom") but I greatly appreciated her letting me help as much as she did.</p>
<p>Donemom - My DS is going into his last semester at Harvard. He went up to Cambridge a week or so before us for the FOP (Freshman Outdoor Program). My H and I along with two other sons drove his stuff up on Move-in Day and we shlepped his stuff into his suite but we could not unpack a thing; it was very hot out so S was lucky he had us lugging stuff for him.Several hrs later he returned from his canoe trip -- tired,
smelly, hungry, anxious to meet his suitemates & uninterested in us.
Once the boys agreed on room assignments, he ate lunch with us and
told us we could leave. We had a hotel room for the night so did things in Boston but didn't see him for dinner or the next morning for breakfast.
Although I understood where he was coming from, my expectations had been entirely different. I thought we were going to help him unpack and get settled in and hang out together. I felt as though we abandoned him but he was okay with the way things turned out.</p>
<p>It's done differently at Northwestern where S#2 goes. On Move In day,
upperclassmen help you carry things up to the dorm room. His frosh and sophomore dorms had no elevators. I helped him unpack and settle in. Once his roomie showed, he told me I could leave. There were a few sessions for parents later that day and then frosh orientation began and parents left.</p>
<p>When my son was five, on his first day of his second year of preschool, he walked to the first landing inside and turned to me and said, "You can go away from my school now."</p>
<p>Now we are about to take him to Tulane, and he has matured to the point where he has enough empathy for me to allow me to help him unpack so I can see what's important to him and how he will live his life. He knows he is central to mine and his father's. </p>
<p>Thank God he's grown up. We would both be crushed by any statement like the one about letting us in "over his dead body."</p>
<p>I also remember blowing off my parents oh so many years ago. It was something to the effect, "OK, you can go now!" I told this little story to my son, and he assured me he would allow me enough time so that I could set up his computer.</p>
<p>Donemom - Although I feel little sympathy for the mom's frustrated nesting instinct, the idea of throwing 6 kids into a suite with all their junk and advising them NOT to select rooms right away sounds totally nuts to me!</p>
<p>My mom and I got along well for 50 years because she never tried to inject herself into my life. She set foot on campus exactly twice--dropoff first day and graduation. As I was paying my own way that was the way I wanted it.</p>
<p>It may work out okay yet. D reports that last year at Harvard, for the suites she is familiar with, they guys had it all worked out on the first day and they never changed rooms or roommates for the rest of the year. So there are no guarantees, but you may well get the chance to see him settled in before you go.</p>
<p>haha monydad. My DH took S1 to Nairobi for the first leg of his Gap Year--and got flicked off by son in 12 hours flat. Son left the wonderful lodge to camp and shoot pool with fellow gappers at some dusty low budget safari site. H toured Kenya by his lonesome for a few days and came home dejected.</p>
<p>I dropped plans to visit son in London and when it came time for him to go to college, he got on the plane by himself, thank you very much.</p>
<p>Still, he was incredulous that we didn't stop in to see him during finals exam week. Who can keep up with the whims of teenagers?</p>
<p>I know I loved seeing my parents for that one special restaurant dinner. After that, they didn't fit into or 'get' my college life. I do remember being anxious to see the back of them....so I cannot imagine my boys wanting me to 'tuck' them into their dorm rooms! I'm with barron on this one. I think they'd rather pound nails.</p>