#WeWantHousing
On Tuesday, the University of Tampa Office of the Dean Students, the Office of the Provost, and Student Government made a major announcement that will affect the on-campus housing selection and living accommodations for the 2016-2017 students. All first year and new transfer students will have more of an opportunity to live on-campus in order to have the possibility to become involved in university organizations and teams. The current students who have been at the university for the least number of semesters will be able to choose their residence first. So next year’s sophomores will pick before the future juniors and seniors. No longer is the housing selection process conducted by the number of credit hours earned, and with that old law, seniors used to have first choice in housing.
The first line of the UT Emergency Operations email states, “We believe that on-campus housing should be provided for those students who will benefit the most from the personal and community support of living on campus.” Essentially they are stating that new students to UT will be able to transition into the college lifestyle and become actively involved in the campus community if they live in the dorm halls. What about the upperclassmen who are already heavily involved in campus organizations and have various jobs at school? The inconvenience of having to commute is absurd. These students are already providing so much of their time and effort to the school and should be rewarded with guaranteed on-campus housing. It also does not help that more than fifty percent of the student population is from out-of-state or out-of-the-country. A lot of those students do not have the opportunity to bring a car or the ability to pay for an off-campus apartment. The other complication is that in May 2016, deconstruction of the other half of Rescom will begin and that will eliminate 140 upperclassmen housing spaces.
For the 2016-2017, the new incoming student housing residences will be Austin, McKay, McNeel Boathouse, Morsani, Smiley, and Vaughn Center. The upperclassmen will have to battle it out for the living quarters in Barrymore Hotel, Brevard, Jenkins, Palm Apartments, Straz, and Urso. The largest change is that Morsani used to be an upperclassmen dorm hall, while Barrymore Hotel was for freshmen; this is a substantially major switch and punishment. Lainey Loudon, a junior Journalism and Communications major, understands the idea behind the new housing procedure for next school year, but disagrees with the method UT has chosen to change the housing rule. Loudon states, “I came to UT knowing that it would be possible for me to live on-campus all four years. If I knew that my quality of living on-campus would be decreased or eliminated with time, I would have reconsidered my decision.” Future juniors and seniors have to consider the idea that when they go to apply for on-campus housing there may be nothing left even though they cannot afford to live away from the university. The housing deposits for upperclassmen are due by February 1st, 2016, and for incoming freshmen they must meet the housing application deadline by May 1st, 2016. A word of advice for the upperclassmen: PAY YOUR HOUSING DEPOSIT ON-TIME!
The Office of the Dean of Students and Office of Residence Life will be hosting open community meetings about the new housing selection process. The dates are October 6th from 8-9 p.m. in Brevard Community Room (during RHA meeting), and October 8th from 1-2 p.m. in Reeves Theater. There is also a petition traveling around on social media that supports the idea of reversing the new housing procedure. Here is a link to the petition if you want to express your opinion about this new procedure: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/reverse-the-housing-rule Even though this new housing procedure seems set in stone, we will have to see the backlash that the Dean of Students and Reslife will receive, which may tell them to consider this vast change that will affect so many students who were not expecting to have this problem. As Loudon summarized it well, “Current students have already committed themselves to UT, and UT should continue to commit to the students by listening to their wants and needs overall, making decisions that are compatible and beneficial for the greater population.”