<p>I visited with my son. The campus is beautiful and we went on a game weekend so that was fun too. My only concern was that the dorms. We went to the grotto and noticed a building all the way on the other side of the lake. Ask some passerbyers, what it was and they said it was Carrol Dorm. I was shocked to see this dorm, in what looked like it was in quarantine. The girls even laughed and said it was a terrible place to live because you are outrageously far from the entire campus and no one goes to parties there because it to far. Then in addition, to that they said Zahm (problably spelled it wrong) was another male dorm with a stigma/label. </p>
<p>I was bummed because you can't chose your dorm and neither of these two seemed very appealing.</p>
<p>Can anyone give me any advice. Does anyone live in either of these dorms that can speak on these topics.</p>
<p>I graduated from ND in the '80s and my steady boyfriend at the time lived in Carroll Hall. I lived in a dorm by the library, so I know that walk quite well! Carroll is far from the main campus, but not egregiously so. You just have to add a few extra minutes to your walk and make sure you have warm clothes for winter! The walk is very pretty, next to the lake, and the students who live there grow very close and have a lot of hall spirit. The rooms are much larger than those in many of the other dorms and have high ceilings. The main drawback is that you can’t pop back to your room quickly if you forget something or only have a short time between classes. All of the guys I knew who lived there loved it–hardly anyone tried to transfer to another dorm after freshman year.</p>
<p>I don’t know anything about Zahm.</p>
<p>People are generally happy where they wind up. You can always request a transfer after freshman year if you’re not, I believe. Most people don’t want to leave the friends they have made, however.</p>
<p>Zahm is fine, it actually has lots of parties. It has a label as being kind of weird but its just a joke. It has good camaraderie as well. As far as Carroll, yea its really far but you can transfer after first semester if you end up assigned there anyways. Nothing to worry about really.</p>