Rensselaer students today have a choice when it comes to housing. There is a multitude of on-campus offerings, ranging from full apartments to single rooms. These are incredibly convenient due to their proximity to campus, the comfort of a respectable and dependable landlord in the form of the Institute, and their ability to foster an overall sense of community.
On the other hand, Troy and its environs provide many options for residence off campus. These provide an even greater diversity in choices available to students; prospective tenants can have their pick of locations, housing types, and number of housemates. What’s more, independent leases are often substantially cheaper than their on-campus counterparts, and offer much more flexibility in terms of dining, lifestyle, and facilities.
Currently, students can choose whether they want to participate in campus housing or not as soon as they complete their first year. This is scheduled to change with next year’s incoming freshman class, however; starting in 2010, sophomores will be required to live either on campus or in certain greek houses as part of the new Sophomore-Year Experience.
We fully support many of the basic principles at the heart of these changes, and we can see some of the community-oriented benefits that the campus can realize by requiring second-year students to stay in Institute-recognized housing. We are concerned, however, that this change will come at the cost of the benefits that off-campus residences bring to students—flexibility, cost, and a greater sense of independence.
The university is being very forthright to prospective students regarding these changes, and next year’s freshman class will be well-apprised of them before they arrive on campus. We commend the administration and the Office of Enrollment for their honesty in this respect, however, we are worried that this sort of restriction may keep otherwise well-suited individuals from giving RPI its due consideration in their college searches.
Overall, however, we recognize the value that the second-year experience can bring to campus, and we appreciate the potential of sophomores living on campus. With that in mind, we would recommend that the Institute make a concerted effort to bring the advantages of off-campus living to the traditional Rensselaer residence halls. By removing the disparities between the two types of housing, we hope that we could remove the trade-off between them and make living on campus truly a win-win situation.
