So How Do They Choose Who Your College Roommate Is?
Feb.08, 2010 in
College Selection
I’ll be starting at George Mason next fall, and I’m just curious as to how they choose roommates for you.
Also, what are the chances of being paired up with/seeing a couple of people I absolutely CANNOT stand in college. (I had a huge falling out with some girl in HS and I just hope not to be paired with her.) Do they pair people up because they’re from the same area?…I hope not.
Thanks!
February 8th, 2010 at 10:33 pm
Mason is a commuter school so there are not too many out of state students. I think it is pretty random. They just fill the rooms up as people register.
February 9th, 2010 at 2:18 am
It really varies. I have seen pairings because the employees got cute (i.e. Laverne and Shirley), same birthday, mothers and fathers had same names. I’ve also seen what seemed to be “hope” – they were hoping one kid would “rub off” on another(putting a high achieving student with a lower end one).
Rarely did roommate pairings seem to make any sense.
In my experience, unless you specifically requested it, you were NEVER matched with someone from your same high school. The idea is to meet new people, not just hang out with the same ones you’ve known for years.
In any case, you are able to switch to live with someone else if it is not working out.
Good luck and congrats on getting into George Mason, I’ve heard very good things about it!
February 9th, 2010 at 8:07 am
I work in a college Housing department. If two students ask to be paired together in a room, each requesting the other on their application, they are often (but not always) placed together in a room. However, if Joe Smith requests Chris Thomas as his roommate on his application, but Chris doesn’t request Joe, those two will not be roommates.
Different schools use different levels of qualifiers to pair students as roommates. Where I work, we use very basic information:
Do you smoke?
Do you object to smoking?
Do you like to wake up early?
Do you like to go to bed late?
There are a couple of other questions, but those are the most important. Some of the assignments are hand made (by someone in the office) and some of them (usually at the start of the year, when there are thousands of students looking for housing) are made by the computer. Those questions are put into the software, and compatible students are matched automatically.
Additionally, almost every school will allow students to switch roommates if there is a roommate conflict, though schools have different rules regarding how this is done.