The time for students to gather up a group of friends and go house hunting is here again.
The housing lottery can be confusing for students. Junior early childhood education major Leah Francis said she had difficulty with the lottery when her group “had a low lottery number and all the rooms available in the first lottery were closed out.” Junior English and education double major Tim Carroll said he has had a similar experience, saying “the uncertainty and randomness of the process is nerve-wracking.”
This year, though, brings along some changes to the lottery, according to Steven Herndon, the assistant dean of students and the executive director of Housing and Residence Life. One of those changes includes the end of the second-chance lottery.
Any sophomore group that is unsuccessful at attaining a property during the regular housing lottery will receive an email with detailed instructions on how to obtain a vacant property for the following year. Junior and senior housing will also be affected by the drop of the second-chance lottery.
All juniors and seniors who receive a housing assignment that they have selected will be given until April 10 to accept or decline this assignment. Based off of the acceptance of a house, any group that has stayed with the lottery and has been unsuccessful in getting a house will then be assigned to a house that has been declined by the group originally assigned to it on April 15. Those groups have until April 18 to accept the second house assignment.
Herndon said another change has allowed students to change groups after the original lottery.
“One change is that if any sophomore group of six is unsuccessful at attaining the property they want, or if any group decides to change for any reason they will be able to reform their group and reapply for housing on March 21-22,” Herndon said.
The first part of the housing lottery has come and gone with special interest housing being assigned on Friday, March 1. For the rest of the UD community, students were able to apply for housing starting Monday, March 4, and the application process continues until 4:30 p.m. on Friday, March 15.
The first group that will receive its lottery numbers will be anyone who applied for six-person sophomore housing and will be notified on March 19 and will be able to select their housing on March 20.
For all other students who are not applying for six-person sophomore housing or do not need to re-group, their housing numbers will be released on April 2. Sophomores will be allowed to pick their property based on their number on April 3 and junior and seniors will be allowed to pick their property on April 5.
For the full list of all important dates and other information, visit UD housing’s website at udayton.edu/studev/housing.
