Question for you US folks

[kellifer]

So, what are my options i guess is the question? If someone were to be moved from college dorms to off campus housing by the college when there was a dorm shortage of some kind? We don't really have a dorm system here at all so I don't really know how it works.

This is for my abouttwoboys fic which is in danger of now being 7k of never being finished... :/ (The movie I'm writing is "Loser").

ETA: It's looking like perhaps a long-term hotel room is the go, thanks everyone!!

Comments

[poor-choices.livejournal.com]

My brother had that problem his junior year of college--it was right after 9/11 so not nearly as many students as usual went abroad, leaving the school with not enough dorms. In his case, he was in school in the town where we lived, so he agreed to move home, but I assume that the school allowed more students to live off campus than they would otherwise. A lot of that, however, depends on the school; my brother was at a small college which only gave students the option of living off-campus for their senior year, and there was a housing lottery to see who got to find apartments, etc.

...I have no idea if that answered your question AT ALL. I can try again if you want!

[snippy]

Some colleges, if they don't allow everybody to live off campus, rent apartments to use as overflow dorm space. Others just make a temporary exception to the rule, and let people find their own living arrangements, sometimes keeping one type of student (freshmen, usually, because upper classmen are assumed to be more mature and able to handle living without the college's supervision) in dorms, other times using a lottery system to determine who gets in the dorms.

[sinanju.livejournal.com]

My college had more students than dorm space. Freshmen were guaranteed a room. Everyone else either found off-campus housing on their own, or participated in the lottery. Numbers were assigned randomly within a class (seniors got the best numbers, then juniors, then sophomores). You got to choose your dorm room in numerical order. Finding a potential roommate with a better number than yours could be very important....

If you were male sophomore* you were almost guaranteed (assuming you got a room at all) to get a dorm room at "The Ranch"--two large dorm buildings several miles from the school which had been bought from the mental hospital next door (which was still operating). The school ran buses back and forth, but not very late. I spent my sophomore year living at the Ranch. (On the bright side, I had a room to myself.)

* Until my junior year, when on-campus housing was split more evenly and women could get exiled to the Ranch too.

[libra-traveller.livejournal.com]

If say it's not a dorm shortage so much as a dorm building hasn't been finished or there's damage, they actually put the students up in a local hotel.

[epeeblade]

Back when I was in undergrad there was a serious dorm shortage. Now, where I went you were only guaranteed housing the first two years. After that you had to fend for yourself. One year they let way too many kids into the Freshman class and ended up turning lounges into dorm rooms (five kids in one room, the bathrooms were communal down the hall) and utilizing the dorms of a local college for the deaf.

But other than the first two years, you were on your own to find an apartment if you didn't make the housing lottery. BTW, my school did not have sorority/fraternity housing, it was not allowed.

[poisontaster]

I don't know if you're writing Sam/Dean or J2. But if you're writing about Stanford...they'd never run out of housing. If you're talking in general...for example, The Fiance's college in Philly rented hotel space and put their students up in the hotels for the term.

[libitina]

It really depends. What college/state/city are they in?

[theladyscribe]

OH! This has actually happened recently at my college! More than likely, someone who is living on campus and has been living on campus for X amount of years would be asked to relinquish their dorm room and be offered some sort of monetary compensation (say, a month's worth of rent for an apartment - possibly more). Most colleges don't allow freshmen (and sometimes sophomores) to live off campus unless they have relatives who live within driving distance (ie, no more than an hour away).

Anyone moved off campus would need either to have a car or be able to live somewhere within walking/biking distance. And unless they have several friends in a similar situation, they'd probably stay in an apartment with a monthly rent. Which means they'd also need a job.

Hope that helps! :)

[alessandriana.livejournal.com]

It varies a fair amount from school to school. In the schools I've gone to, you're only guaranteed on-campus housing for freshman year. Past that, you can certainly apply for on-campus housing-- you get put in a lottery, as others have said-- but if you don't get in in time, you're on your own. You have to make your own arrangements. Generally there are a fair number of apartment complexes nearby that cater to college students.

[morbidmuse.livejournal.com]

My school has enrolled too many students for two of my four years here. After they run out of space, they put the extra students in local hotel rooms. Then there is a small bus that runs that shuttles the students to the campus and back. The bus should run from around 7-7:30am until about 2am. As soon as there are dorm openings, the college tries to get the students out of the hotel rooms and back on campus.

I hope that helps in some way.

[blucasbabe.livejournal.com]

My college had dorms and frats and sororities on campus for students to live in (which was required for Freshmen unless they lived at home with their parents.) Then there were university owned (or subsidized) off-campus apartments that student could live in, based on first-come first-served. Then there were the privately owned apartments that students could rent, and then there were privately owned houses and duplexes and stuff that students could rent all around town.

If there had ever been a dorm shortage, I imagine the university would have utilized the off-campus apartments they owned, or would have rented out a set of privately owned apartments near campus.

OT

[intermezzo]

Are you ok? I've heard what's happening there and I'm worried.