High-rise residents no longer need to switch rooms mid-year

By Jeffrey Careyva 08/20/15 2:37am

Students moving into three-bedroom quads can get more permanently settled — they are no longer mandated to switch rooms after the fall semester.

Effective for the 2015-16 academic year, Penn’s Housing Terms & Conditions has dropped the clause that states, “Residents of multiple-occupancy units, where bedroom size and single bedroom spaces are unequal, are required to switch rooms between semesters.”

The defunct policy largely applied to groups of four residents living in three-bedroom apartments in the high rises. Residential Services and College Houses & Academic Services will no longer enforce the old rule, leaving student residents to come to room agreements on their own for the full academic year.

“In collaboration with CHAS, the policy was removed since most of the quads are filled during room selection by groups of friends and many students make their own decisions about who lives where in advance of or at arrival,” Director of Residential Services John Eckman wrote in an email. “Some leave it to first-come, first-serve.”

Living in a three-bedroom quad rather than a four-bedroom one amounts to over a $2,000 reduction in price per year, though now only two residents will reap the benefits of a single bedroom in those layouts.

“We expect that in a vast majority of cases students can figure out what works best for the group,” Eckman continued. “There’s nothing preventing them from switching among themselves going forward.”

Among friends, choosing a room doesn’t have to be life or death. “Who got what room was not a big deal,” College sophomore Kieona Cook, who lives in a three-bedroom apartment in Harrison College House, said. Cook is happy that she won’t need to swap bedrooms at the end of the semester, “because moving in is always awful, and a second time could only be worse,” she said.

“None of us were very particular about what room we wanted in our Harrison apartment,” College sophomore Samuel Wert said. “One person just wanted to be away from the kitchen — we aren’t fighting for the biggest room. I’ll be happy to get settled in and not have to move around until the end of the year.”

Freshman move-in lasts Aug. 20 to 21, and classes begin Wednesday, Aug. 26.

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