Wednesday, Oct. 12, Residence Life revealed changes to next year’s housing policy, including a reduction in available rooms. Following last year’s developments and challenges with housing, including an unprecedented waitlist of 600 upperclassmen attempting to live on campus and the announcement of the Housing and Dining Comprehensive Facilities Plan, finding housing has become a contentious issue for students and in local politics.
In the email, Residence Life announced the one-year closure of Monroe Hall for renovations, the switch of Dawson and Dupont Hall to freshmen housing and the suspension of same-room sign up. For the 2023-24 school year, the housing capacity will fall from 4838 to 4469.
“The number of beds available for rising Juniors and Seniors will fluctuate from year to year as we work toward completion of the Housing and Dining Comprehensive Facilities Plan,” Director of Housing & Residence Life Harriet Kandell wrote to The Flat Hat. “We anticipate that Fall 2023 and Fall 2024 will be the most challenging. As we open new buildings in Fall 2025, we will have much more space available.”
Residence Life anticipates having 1000 beds spaces reserved for upperclassmen; this number, according to Kandell, includes spaces in locations “such as special interest housing in Language Houses, Mosaic, Africana House, Fraternity & Sorority Houses and Resident Assistants.”
Kandell confirmed that Residence Life is expecting another large waitlist for this year.
Each year we anticipate and are prepared for a waiting list for housing. With the closure of Yates and Monroe Halls for the 23-24 academic year we anticipate a housing wait list of potentially 400-500 students. While we cannot guarantee that all students initially placed on the housing wait list will eventually be offered on-campus housing, in past years we have been able to house all students who actively remained on the wait list, including Fall 2022. As of now for this fall we currently have around 160 undergraduate vacancies throughout campus. In Spring 2022 we had a waiting list of over 600 students. All of those students were able to secure housing for this year.
“Each year we anticipate and are prepared for a waiting list for housing,” Kandell said. “With the closure of Yates and Monroe Halls for the 23-24 academic year we anticipate a housing wait list of potentially 400-500 students. While we cannot guarantee that all students initially placed on the housing wait list will eventually be offered on-campus housing, in past years we have been able to house all students who actively remained on the wait list, including Fall 2022. As of now for this fall we currently have around 160 undergraduate vacancies throughout campus. In Spring 2022 we had a waiting list of over 600 students. All of those students were able to secure housing for this year.”
As upperclassmen search for off-campus housing, many have spoken out against the general lack of housing options in Williamsburg, and even less that are affordable and within walking distance.
Giselle Boudreaux ’25 received her very last choice for a dorm last year, and did not want to gamble her choice by staying on campus this year, especially as she heard most housing options are leased in the fall and room selection takes place in the spring. She began looking for off-campus housing in mid-September and started asking upperclassmen if they knew any options.
“In my opinion, it seems very early to be looking that early,” Boudreaux said.
Boudreaux was able to eventually secure an apartment within walking distance, though she says the process to sign the lease and pay the deposit was very fast-paced. Boudreaux does not have a car, so being near campus was vital.
“And so they got back to me eventually and basically all of the units were snapped up within like a week, a week and a half, and we got the very, very last one,” she said. “So it was very hectic. It was fast, fast paced.”
Josh Shankman ’23 was hoping to find on-campus housing last year with his three other suitemates — two of whom were planning to study abroad — when they found out they were on the waitlist.
“We had never heard of them running out of space,” Shankman said. “…They had also increased their freshman class size and everything, so there was a lot of frustration, particularly with communication, because we felt like if we had known that… it might be difficult to get on-campus, we would have looked at our alternatives a little differently,”
Shankman was one of the last people able to sign a lease for one of the remaining doubles in Midtown Row.
“We ended up finding out at the time pretty quickly that there were like five doubles left in the entirety of the Midtown complex,” Shankman said. “And that was the, you know, no quads, no triples, just five doubles and a few singles. And so it was, you know, pretty scrambled of, ‘hey, everybody, call your parents, figure out if you can do this. Like, here’s how much it’ll be. You would need to know in the next two days whether we’re going to do this or not, because otherwise we’re going to not be able to sign because it’ll close up.’”
While Midtown Row was developed with the intent to be student housing, its higher prices and further distance from the College do serve as a barrier for some students. Still, Midtown Row’s 600+ housing capacity makes it the largest apartment complex in close proximity to the College.
“So the standard pricing for Midtown, I believe in a quad is around $900 a month, which I think is typical of what you’ll find students paying if they’re living off campus in a house or a little farther away,” Shankman said. “The doubles at midtown are $1300 a month, so I’m paying an extra $400 a month to live, as opposed to what my option would have been had I known we weren’t going to live on campus, which kind of adds up over the course of a 12 month lease.”
Sydney Clayton ’25 only began looking for housing at the start of October, and her and her future roommates have not been able to secure any housing yet.
I didn’t think, like, too many people had started getting housed, and I thought, there’d still be a lot of options, but I was wrong about that. And pretty much everything now that’s like close to campus or affordable is taken.
“I only started looking like a week or two ago, and I thought that was fine, you know, cause it’s October,” Clayton said. “I didn’t think, like, too many people had started getting housed, and I thought, there’d still be a lot of options, but I was wrong about that. And pretty much everything now that’s like close to campus or affordable is taken. So like I’ve heard, I haven’t confirmed this, but I heard like Midtown is full and you can’t really get anything if you’re not on the waitlist. And there’s like all the houses near campus, they’re either already leased or like passed down through sororities or other organizations, so if i’m not in that organization I don’t have access to it.”
A representative from Midtown Row confirmed that there was already a waitlist of “100s of students” for next year’s housing. Though some spaces are available, they are reportedly going very fast.
Clayton, like many other upperclassmen, says she feels frustrated at the lack of housing availability in Williamsburg.
“I knew I wouldn’t be able to get on-campus housing really because there’s the huge freshmen class… and I think they’re probably gonna admit a lot more students for the next year or two,” Clayton said. “… So I figured it’d be pretty impossible to get on-campus housing and I know that they stopped doing the same-room sign up. I think that was like the only guaranteed way to stay on campus but can’t do that anymore either. So it’s just been like not really having a backup plan and just trying to find like any available option that I can.”
Conor Sokolowsky ’23, who serves as the only student on the Williamsburg City Council’s Planning Commission, says the commission is looking into affordable housing options for Williamsburg residents and also students at the College.
“My biggest goal is to just increase student voice in city matters, because right now, a lot of times students are sidelined, even though they make up over half of the population in Williamsburg,” Sokolowsky said. “…. We were here before the country was even founded, let alone the city. And a lot of older residents have like really tough times living with and around students, and I’d just like to resolve those tensions.”
Sokolwoksy says even when students can secure off-campus housing, the three-person housing rule and predatory property managers make it more difficult and less affordable for students.
“A. it makes it more affordable, more people can pay to live in a house, and then B. it uses up all the space,” Sokolwoksy said, in reference to the three-person rule limiting housing options. “…. The property managers are a little bit aggressive and predatory to students. They don’t maintain correct property upkeep because they’ll know there’s like more than three students living in a place, and they’ll kind of hold that against them to not do that.”
Residence Life is also trying to address some of the issues finding off-campus housing, with Kandell saying that they’re sharing the room selection process much earlier than last year and hosting off-campus housing fairs.
“We also want to share that while being waitlisted can initially be distressing, last year we were able to offer housing to 100% of those that actively remained on the list by August 1, 2022,” Kandell wrote to The Flat Hat. “The housing market is very fluid for both on and off campus options. As students make plans, they remove themselves from the waiting list. Students will withdraw from the process for a variety of reasons such as study abroad opportunities and other changes to individual circumstances. When this happens, students will be contacted with an offer of either a Room Selection time slot or a housing assignment as these spaces open.”
These off-campus housing fairs will occur as follows:
- November 11, 2022 between 11:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. at the Sadler Center
- February 3, 2023 time and location TBD
- February 22, 2023 time and location TBD
This is nothing new. When I was a student, there was something called “random elimination” in the housing process. Every year, the computer would generate a list of students to be eliminated from the housing lottery because there wasn’t enough housing available. People dreaded getting those letters shoved under their dorm room doors. Some people eventually got back into the lottery as other students opted to live off campus, study abroad, transfer to another school, etc. But others didn’t.
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