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KarenNC

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  1. It's still older (2012?), but the Prius V is the more wagon-style vs the regular Prius, so hopefully a bit more room, and we'll only have three of us in the car. ? Yes, the orientation visit went really well, as has every other visit. The only issue we've had with the school is this roommate switching.
  2. Good point, it's something to consider. She's got an unlimited food plan (required of all freshmen on campus), so it isn't like she'll starve, and they do have a full kitchen and ice machine for the dorm. This school brings in pods at the end of the semester for students to drop off things they don't want to take home so that they can be donated to Habitat or a local Catholic outreach center, so we did drop by the Habitat Restore to see if they had anything, but I hadn't considered that the resell for things other than textbooks might be active at the beginning of the semester as well. I had wondered whether we could order something and have it delivered but not sure how that would work with her schedule and needing to be around (I don't really want to go near a store near campus on move-in weekend). Maybe she could work with someone she meets to go pick up a fridge. If she were closer, I wouldn't think twice about helping her get anything later she needed, but almost four hours away makes it a bigger challenge so I'm trying to be sure she'll have everything she needs to start with. Once she's there, there's the option of renting a storage unit over long breaks for big items. Guess it may be time to start practicing stepping back and trusting she will work things out. ?
  3. It would make things *so* much easier if the school just did that with the micro-fridge and had a locking drawer in either the desk or other furniture. I'm really hoping she and whoever she rooms with just decide to split the rent on a micro-fridge from the school, to be honest, even though I'm very frugal and it would be more expensive (we could easily buy a nice two door mini-fridge with separate freezer for a good bit less than the rent for a year). We have a microwave our godson used recently in college, but I'd rather not have to transport it along with all the other stuff, especially not a fridge in our Prius V! If she ends up moving to the honors apartments next year when she's eligible, they have kitchens in the apartment and won't necessarily need a mini-fridge anyway.
  4. Thanks. It went well and she's looking forward to August. She talked with a number of students that she said seemed nice and made connections with some additional clubs---the SCUBA club, hammocking club, LGBTQ+ club, etc. I've actually never been at all worried that she'll find friends on campus here and we've never expected that her roommate would be a primary source of friendship. She said there's a very active student engagement program which provides options, including alcohol and other substance free weekend fun activities. She has already done a practice with the aikido club (when we went for accepted students' day) and is taking a tech theatre class that will get her involved there, something she really enjoys, so will have some built-in community in those in addition to the honors community activities. There's a congregation from our denomination (Unitarian Universalist) just down the road, which will also be helpful. I'm glad she chose the larger school over the smaller ones where she was also accepted, because they simply have more options and a much wider pool of students, so it's more likely she'll find her group fairly easily. Having just made the 8 hour round trip twice in three days, we are particularly glad she's made a few initial connections with students from closer to our area, which will hopefully translate into options for rides at least part of the way home! ?
  5. Thanks. She's already heard the stories from us about our roommate woes and knows that a randomly matched roommate isn't actually likely to become her close friend and shouldn't be expected to be. If it happens, it's a big bonus. ? I had two different much less than ideal matches--one freshman year and then one junior year, when one of my roommates transferred over the summer and the other was doing study abroad for a semester in the fall (we had been in a triple). Basically 180 degrees opposite of each other, zero common interests, but we were able to be decent to each other and get through the year/semester without any real drama (aside from the time I found my roommate had a keg in the room for a party and my teetotaling, very conservative parents were on the way for a visit). My husband had a good roommate, but one of his suitemates decided the couch in the suite's common area was a perfect place for sex--loudly, openly, and frequently (sex is not a spectator sport!!). We've discussed possible strategies for handling that scenario. I met my sophomore year roommates at orientation before freshman year. She's got a third assignment now, so we'll see how this one goes and if it sticks. She's become a good bit less enthusiastic about trying to make a meaningful connection with the girl before school starts, which is unfortunate. I don't see finding friends as an issue, and she's already made connections with some groups.
  6. So they do (to a certain extent), as I've pointed out.
  7. I see that as one potential issue, as obviously several others have based on their replies, and was addressing that particular response to that particular potential issue. I've said I can foresee issues where my daughter would want to change out as well based on a person's actions.That's why I find the lack of communication problematic and say that is has the potential to create unnecessary awkwardness in future relationships between students. When one's personal living space is on campus, then it becomes a part of college attendance and governed by the policies of the college. Off-campus is a different situation entirely, with the exception of a very few schools that try to control students' behavior off-campus as well.
  8. The specific issue of romantic drama has been raised in this thread, including the particular analogy I mentioned. Reaching out for support, yes, for potential friendship, yes, which may eventually turn into a roommate or even a romantic partner, but specifically to say find another gay person as a roommate solely because they are gay brings in the double standard. Common interest and activity suggestions are very valid, but, yes, there is a level of difference between suggesting looking in common interest groups for a roommate and suggesting finding another gay person simply because they are gay. A Pagan club, social activism club, the Catholic Center, and pro-life groups are tied to common choices rather than innate sexual identity, and particularly not to a sexual identity that has been demonized in society for a very long time as amoral, hyper-sexual, promiscuous, and predatory. Students in the majority have the option to be highly selective in tailoring that comfortable home space. Those in minority groups usually don't, even though they are also paying for it, and, yes, I do see a part of college as a time to have stereotypes challenged.
  9. I realize the suggestions were well-intentioned, but I wanted to raise awareness of the double standard implied. Placing two gay students of the same gender together can raise exactly the same potential romantic drama issues that placing straight males and females together can, and two gay students of the same gender can be just friends/roommates, as straight males and females can. She certainly plans to connect with the LGBTQ+ support services and the student LGBTQ+ club in general, and may, in fact, end up with a roommate who is gay, bisexual, or transgender, either by choice or by luck of the draw. We'll have to see how it works out.
  10. At this point, I expect she won't be seen as eligible for one of the apartments, but it depends on how her status is interpreted. Because she has a lot of dual enrollment credits, her standing for registration is sophomore, but her admission status is freshman. Honors freshman have to live in the honors dorm, which is a traditional hall-style, but upperclassmen have the option of the honors section of the apartments. She should know more after orientation, where she is now. The access to a kitchen (and a private bedroom) does make it attractive to her and may be the way she goes next year, as she enjoys cooking. Not having guaranteed access to a car for grocery shopping is a bit of a concern for doing primarily her own cooking right now, though she will likely make friends with others with cars and there is some local public transportation. She has been trying to connect through the social media groups for freshmen, and will have a chance to meet some folks in person and explore some of the clubs more in-depth now that she's at orientation. The fact that she can only room with another honors freshman narrows the pool quite a bit (there are less than 200 of them, I believe, compared to over 2K in the overall freshman class). It will all work out in the end. The suggestions to specifically look for a roommate in the LGBTQ+ group, while well-intentioned, are hitting me as saying, "She should look for a gay roommate, because students shouldn't have to be worried about any potential romantic drama with a roommate disrupting their studies," when the meaning is pretty clearly "my straight student shouldn't have to be worried." This has the effect of deliberately putting her in *exactly* the same situation the straight folks are using as justification to not room with a gay person ("Well, I wouldn't want my son rooming with a girl, either, because they might become attracted to each other"), so a rather stark double standard. By that reasoning, she should be rooming only with a gay male (not inherently a bad idea, but not an option at this school), and I don't know what bisexual students would be expected to do.
  11. True, and I agree that moving in with a significant other should only be done as a positive thing, not to avoid a negative situation, however that's typically a situation that arises after the two have been roommates for some period of time, not preemptively, so a different scenario altogether. My issue with this switching beforehand continues to be the way in which it is at least appearing it's able to be done. Again, let me preface that I'm acknowledging that we don't know the specific reason these girls opted out (which they appear to have done based on the wording of the call from housing), so I'm speaking of the practice in general. There are three scenarios I'm seeing for switching before the students have met or lived together at all: A) The school shuffled due to unknown administrative issues, one drops out, etc. Okay, irritating because kids start getting invested in a roommate relationship and start planning, possibly buying, based on the original assignment. If this is a regular occurrence perhaps the school should wait to announce assignments until things are likely to be more stable. There should be no harm in telling the students the situation is related to this, even if they can't go into specifics. B) After listing as random, one of the roommates finds someone they actively want to room with, say a team mate or someone they met at orientation. Again, potentially irritating because of the change in plans, but understandable. This is a change "to" something positive, and, again, there should be no problem in the administration mentioning that this is the general situation. C) One of the roommates says, "I don't want to live with this person because I found out/think they are [insert label] and [insert label] people are [insert negative characteristic(s)]." The label could be anything-- "gay," "non-Christian," "theatre person," "liberal," "Catholic," "black," "conservative," "Muslim," "athlete," "science major," "homeschooler," "Jewish," "fat," "Southerner," "from a small town," "from a big city," "working class," "ugly," "poor," "rich," whatever. This is without having met the person, without exchanging more than a few "hello" texts or seeing a few photos, so it's highly likely to be based on stereotypes and assumptions. This is the one I have trouble with, and the one that the lack of communication suggests. To my mind, college is about challenging those stereotypes and assumptions, one of the places where you should actually expect to encounter and learn to live with people who may be different than you, at least if you haven't picked an extremely homogeneous school precisely to avoid that. So, for switches among students who are (relatively) randomly assigned by the school before the semester starts, I would expect b and possibly a to occur and both students be told the general reason, but as an administration would put very tight restrictions on students being able to do c. In this case, maybe the school does have those restrictions and I just don't know about it. The school does have a policy allowing an open room switch after two weeks of residency if things aren't working out once you have actually met the person and your concerns are based on actual behaviors and facts rather than assumptions. I do say this even as someone who had poor fits (though not absolutely horrible or unsafe ones) both times I had a random roommate assigned. In one case, we made it through the year, in the other we switched for spring semester to people we'd rather room with. I also say it as someone who has had a history of inaccurate negative assumptions applied to me because of stereotypes.
  12. She's going to try to talk to someone while at orientation this week to find out possible outcomes. Based on reading the housing contract, I think the most likely outcome if she doesn't get a roommate that sticks before move-in is that they will keep her in her current room at the current rate, but she has to leave the other side of the room empty and ready for a student to be placed there if it's needed. Not an ideal limbo, but actually may be good experience for potentially being an RA, since, while some RAs there have single rooms, some are in double rooms and may be assigned temporary roommates at any point in the semester.
  13. I'm actually primarily irritated at the way the school is handling this rather than the kids involved. There has to be a way to approach it that doesn't set up the likelihood of creating unnecessary awkwardness and issues between the students. Don't worry, she's not changing anything, and is mostly annoyed that she can't pin down whether her roommate will already have a fridge. ?
  14. Thanks, I had read that but forgotten about it. She and I both agree that it is likely for the best, if annoying, because she's not aggressive about it, but is going to be who she is. Some of these issues have been a big part of her college search, looking for a place that isn't so homogeneous that it would be hard to find a place socially. I steered her away from several schools that, while great fits academically and who would have likely given her great financial aid, showed a lot of evidence of only grudgingly tolerating students who were non-Christian or LGBTQ+. I told her she needed to look for a place where she was accepted and valued, not just tolerated, because it's no way to spend four years, feeling you have to fly under the radar to fit in. It's been the yardstick we've used for homeschool groups all along--if the group is only willing to tolerate you as long as you don't actually do anything to make them remember you are different in some way, it's not the group for you. We were very fortunate to have found a great inclusive group for support throughout our homeschooling years. The question of whether this happens more to students with more visible differences had occurred to her in part because she's going from two years in dual enrollment on a campus which is 77% minority to a university campus which is just about the opposite, so is wondering about various ways that will likely shape her experiences.
  15. Thanks a lot for the perspective. If the school had just put up some sort of disclaimer at the beginning, along the lines of " here's your roommate, but be aware that the assignment may change over the course of the summer as campus housing needs change," it would have been helpful. Since she is hoping to be an RA, it's also good to hear a bit about your daughter's experience.
  16. They did a very basic survey---do you snore, are you a heavy sleeper, neat or not, morning/night person, etc--so not totally random. I agree that the key difference I see here is the mutuality of the decision. Nothing wrong with wanting to room with someone one knows or with whom one has things in common. It's the sudden "everything's great" to a "you have a new roommate" a week later to a few days later getting a call from housing wanting you to know that even though two people have requested to switch they want you to know you have a support system, no warning from the roommate, but no one will say anything about the reason for the switch that is the issue. She'd love to have a single, but it's not an option for freshman in the honors dorm and she can't switch living communities because her scholarship is tied to the honors program, as well as a lot of their programming being held in that honors dorm. She is a sophomore by credits (freshman for admissions purposes) due to dual enrollment credits, so there's a slim possibility they could say she could move into the honors section of the apartments where she'd have a single bedroom and share the apartment with 1-7 other girls, but it's unlikely. I'm also not interested in paying $1500 a year more due to a situation she did not create (since she's not the one rejecting roommates), so I would be asking for a grant or fee waiver to cover the difference if it was suggested.
  17. Absolutely agreed, which is why she is very open on instagram.
  18. Backstage and tech work only, which doesn't tend to fit the stereotype in that manner. ? I don't inherently object to shuffling around, and the school does allow an open room change period two weeks into the semester, once they've had a chance to actually meet in person. It's the way it's being done with no explanation that I believe sets up a lot of potential for unnecessary awkwardness and difficulty in relationships among this small group that will be doing a lot of things together over the course of the next four years. The freshman class of honors students is only about 175-200 and they will be in classes for honors freshmen only that are about 20 students each, living in the same area of the same dorm, doing activities and service projects together, trips together for honors only, etc, so it isn't like they aren't going to be seeing each other frequently.
  19. Could be, we may never know. When no one wants to talk about the reason and it happens more than once in a short period, however, it certainly doesn't feel innocuous.
  20. There's a difference in being offered a list of potentials and choosing one over the others for whatever reason than being assigned one, the other being notified, then saying no, not that one, move me somewhere else, with no explanation. So who would the friend suggest bisexual students should be allowed to room with?
  21. Thanks, it's good to know this isn't totally unusual. We've never heard anyone mention having this happen prior to school starting and hadn't noticed anything in the info from the school about the option, so it seemed to be coming out of left field, especially to happen twice so quickly. I had a random pairing twice when I was in school, once for freshman year and once because my roommate was doing study abroad for a semester, and it was just one and done both times. They were not good fits either time, so maybe these changes are working to her advantage. Fingers crossed! ? She's going to orientation soon, so we'll see if she makes any connections there. It does remind her that if the situation is reversed and she wants to change for a positive or innocuous reason like that, it would be helpful for future relationships with her classmates to communicate--give some sort of explanation or at least a mention to the other person. When one gets messages constantly from large parts of society that one's basic identity is unacceptable, it's hard to put a positive spin on the unknown in this sort of situation.
  22. 17K students and a public school, so much less likely to be so than many of the privates. We *are* in NC, but this school doesn't have a rep or give the appearance of being ultra-conservative and has various active social justice and identity-based student groups, both liberal and conservative, more so than some of the other public schools we visited. The larger public universities definitely tend to be more liberal than the overall state or many smaller or private schools. They do have various living/learning communities, but this is specifically within the honors living community at this school, which she is required to live in freshman year to keep her scholarship, so moving to another living community or dorm isn't an option. She understands that it's possible that it could be coincidental and chalked the first one up to that, but additional quick switches raises questions. I would think that if it were a positive reason such as you mention, the roommates would be more likely to have said something about it to my daughter.
  23. I hope they do, too! She does take social justice very seriously, but is rather introverted, is a very serious student, and likes a quiet retreat, so the idea that she would be a danger to others studying was a bit amusing. That doesn't preclude that she like any other student may indeed have friends over periodically. Ultimately, yes, they or their parents obviously did, and I can actually see situations in which my daughter might decide to ask for a switch, if , say, the person's instagram or other interaction showed they were extremely aggressive and abusive to those who were different from them or it was obvious they were interested in illegal or unsavory activities. She'd definitely rather let someone who is going to have severe problems with her basic identity self-select out, which is why she is very open about who she is. Since we don't and can't know the full picture at this point, I have encouraged her to try not to negatively pre-judge these girls and their reasons for switching and be open to them as classmates. It has made us more highly aware of our white cisgender privilege in being assumed "safe" and "part of us" until someone learns a different label for you that they deem not to be so, which is why she wondered if this might be a more common experience for those whose differences are more visible (like skin color or wearing a hijab) than hers. I am rather surprised that it's allowable and evidently very easy to switch at this point and have suggested she ask at orientation if there's some kind of limit or deadline so that she knows better what to expect. The website only indicates that after two full weeks of residency, there's an open room change option based on available vacancies, and that irresolvable conflicts can be addressed on a case by case basis afterwards, so we're confused.
  24. Really? Which ones suggest many visitors, in particular more than for girls involved in team sports like the roommates (as I also mentioned in the response)? I would have thought one would at least ask about sleep preferences before preemptively switching roommates. The original matching survey included questions about night/morning person, snoring, cleanliness, light/heavy sleeper as basic compatibility measures. I would expect that that sort of thing to have been already taken into consideration.
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