Off-Campus Housing: For Those Tired of Dorm Life

By Audra Foster

The Office of Residence Life has announced they are not renewing the leases for four off-campus houses next year. It doesn’t mean people are being asked to move out this very moment, but that next year there will be that many less off-campus houses to choose from. Which, if you’re an up-and-coming upperclassmen and you’re tired of dorm life, means you might be shit out of luck.

In a school of only 2,600 people, it becomes quickly apparent whose face you’re going to be seeing most often if you live on campus. In a dorm, you see the people in your hallway day in and day out—if you’re lucky, you know and like some of them. There are, however, bound to be people you’d really rather not see. Although it is quite likely that it will happen more and more as life progresses, I can’t help but feel that, if given the choice, most people would choose to move away from all that. In a world of opportunities, why would anyone choose to remain among those they don’t like? Or, if they are of a saintly disposition and don’t hold any particular ill-will towards other humans, then why not choose a more physically appealing living situation? Because 120-odd people living in one building make one hell of a mess.

I admit, I’m only a freshman—but I know dorms. After three years of boarding school, and thus three years of dorm life—single sex dorms, mind you—I’m ready to be done with it all. I’m ready to explore my off-campus options. I want to have a cozy little apartment with the friends I could stand to live with, in a cozy building not situation in the center of campus, which is quite often a busier place than I want it to be. I would sacrifice a short walk to my classes for a little peace and privacy. I would sacrifice ‘dorm pride’ for my own bathroom. Happily. I’m not trying to complain overmuch, or be the person who does nothing but moan about how much they hate their dorm, but I, personally, would welcome a dramatic change in my living situation. If I’m going to spend the rest of my life living independently, then the earlier I learn how to do so, the better, so that one day I don’t get thrown out on my ass with no sense of how to live alone.

Dorms are so communal that you end up knowing things about people even if you didn’t really want to. Apartments and theme houses, it seems to me, foster a much preferred sense of privacy, that what goes on in the house, or in the room, can actually stay in the house or in the room. On such a small campus, gossip travels quickly—in a hallway of roughly 40 people, gossip travels instantaneously. If someone throws up in the hallway, everyone knows who it is. If someone is always bringing back guys into their room, everyone knows who it is. If someone plays music, everyone knows. If someone has an itch, EVERYONE KNOWS. It’s extremely tiresome for those who like to keep their private lives, well, private.

The same could happen in every apartment building, I know—but living with those in your year pretty much guarantees you’re going to see the same faces you see in class, at parties, in the dining hall. And if you don’t like those faces very much, where do you go to get away from them? Where is someone supposed to escape to? I’d like to go as far away as I can—even if it’s only off this campus by a street or two.