The annual dorm room lottery is now online.
Students will no longer participate in person in the Lemmond Theater, as they have in previous years.
Officials hope the web-based system will be more efficient for students.
Assistant Director Residence Life AJ Nudo said the process is going to be a challenge, but he thinks it is for the best.
“What we’re implementing this year is an online system, so it’s going to work very similar to how it used to. The only difference is students are going to do it from their rooms, or their computers, and not having to show up at a specific place,” said Nudo. “Students will have, similar to class registration, to be unlocked at a certain time according to the order of selection. Seniors are first, and then so on and so forth.”
The former in-person system was an all-day task, he said.
“Students would physically come to a room on campus in the order of selection, and would come and pick their rooms in person.”
Nudo said the university chose the online lottery to remain in step with procedures at other schools.
“We are changing because we are trying to keep up with the times of what other schools are doing. This is the way many schools are functioning. They are not doing in-person room selections anymore.”
Nudo added that tech savvy-students will be comfortable with the new web-based system.
“It’s more convenient for the students to do this rather than to go to a certain place, sit in a room for who knows how long, waiting for our time to come up, because inevitably these things run long.”
Nudo said the process is simpler.
“Students can do it in the comfort of their room. If they’re not on campus, they can use their iPad’s, their phones. It will be more easily accessible for students to be able to do it from wherever.”
To participate, Nudo said students will be provided with a key code and a time-frame to participate.
he said there are also ways some students can receive room assignments even earlier.
“Say you wanted to live with someone who had a better selection time, or they were older, you would give that person your key code, and they would put you in to their room, or their room in the townhouse, and that would be your room for next year.”
While he said there are some concerns about the process, such as possible Internet outages or too many people overloading the server, he hopes to have worked out the kinks for this year’s students.
“We think we put a system together this year to space everyone out that there’s not going to be a massive flood of people into the system at one time.”
He said it may take a little time for upperclassmen to get used to.
“For the upperclassmen it will be a transition because it’s something different. But I think overall it’s going to be more convenient to the students to do it this way.”
Officials have been working on the new lottery process for about two years.
“We didn’t want to rush the system out and have a lot of problems, so we put another 12 months into working on it, and we think we’ve got it to a point where we’ve hopefully worked out the majority of the bugs.”
“We think we’ve gotten it to a place as user-friendly as possible, as simple as possible for the students to be able to go in, and easily select their rooms, select their roommates, select their meal plans, and have it done as quickly and easily as possible,” he said.
Sean Vitale, resident advisor in Alumnae Hall, said it’s important for students to plan their housing choices early.
“I haven’t seen the new system yet, but from a residence life perspective, I think it’s going to be a lot easier. We talked about the new system with the director and it’s going to be cleaner, but it’s going to require a bit more planning on the part of the students. You’re going to have to have back-up plans, and you’re going to have to be ready to make your selection.”