On Saturday March 8, freshmen, sophomores, and juniors participated in Puget Sound’s housing lottery.
The procedure went as follows: “All current on-campus students will receive a random lottery number based on class priority. Each assigned lottery number will come a scheduled time between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. when each number will be called. Students will check-in at the Murray Board Room in Wheelock. When it is time for your number’s group to sign up for housing, you will be ushered in to the Rotunda where stations for all of the various housing options will be available and students can pick any space that is open.”
Overall, the atmosphere was stressful.
The two-year housing requirement made it very hard for students to get their first or even second choice of residence. Many students were very concerned that they would not be able to live with their friends.
The housing lottery favors upperclassmen even though they are not required to live on campus. Freshmen and sophomores, however, are required to live on campus. Therefore, they should be given top priority.
“Sophomores should really have first choice for on campus living because we have to live on campus, we are not choosing to,” freshman Kelsee Levey said.
“Those upperclassmen that are choosing to should get last choice or maybe first pick with houses. The way things are working sucks. I know a lot of people that ended up unsatisfied with their living situations. It’s not something you want to rely on luck for.”
“I felt like the whole thing was very unorganized,” freshman Nichole Hine said.
“They had all of us crowd into this space and they didn’t explain anything to us.”
In regards to class ranking, Hine believes that “it is unfair that freshman get the last pick of houses because we are required to live on campus next year, sophomores and juniors are not. I think it is not okay that we get stuck with the least desirable housing situations.”
“The housing lottery was extremely stressful and poorly organized,” Levey said.
“No one really understood what was going on and we were all trapped in a small room waiting for our groups to be called. There has to be a better, fairer way for all of this to happen. I wasn’t disappointed with how everything turned out, but I wasn’t satisfied.”
The whole housing process was unnecessarily stressful and angered a lot of students at Puget Sound.
While it is understandable that meeting the housing needs and expectations of so many students is very difficult to maneuver, there has to be a better way to make the process less overwhelming and disappointing.
Students who are required to live on campus should have first pick and students who are not required to, but want to, should get to pick after that.
