Our new life in the dorms!

For a college freshman living in a residence hall is a whole new experience. There are many decisions that go into deciding where you want to live, and after making that final decision you have to live and deal with the choice you’ve made.

The first step to the whole process is choosing what building you want to live in before you even attend Illinois State University. Making these decisions isn’t always an easy task when you have 8 different dorms to pick from. In order to do this you have to weigh the pros and cons for each dorm and just go with the one that sounds the best. Then the next step is choosing a roommate, you have to figure out if you would like to life with some one you know or do a random roommate. So do you play it safe and pick someone from high school that you know, or do you go with a complete stranger taking the chance of you both getting along or completely hating each other. This decision is one of the toughest. After you think you are done with all your decisions you now have to decide what floor to want to live on. There are many options for that too; you can have an all girls/all boys’ floor, co-ed or themed floor. This has a big effect on your experience because they’re going to be the people on your floor and the neighbors that you will be living with. After all is done and decisions finalized you are stuck with them. One of the hardest things you have to learn in college is how to live with other people. It is not like your living with your family where you can yell at each other when you get upset or just being able to do as you please. You have to learn how to live with your roommate, resolve your conflicts and learn how to live on your own at the same time. Not only are you trying to adjust to living with them, you also have to adjust to how to share and very small room with another person. Most freshmen are not used to staying in such a small room with another person. Most students have had the dorm size room to themselves or their room was larger than their current dorm room. It could be that you are a neat freak and you roommate is messy or the other way around which can often lead to conflict this is when you have to find a median, set rules that are clear and be open to talking if there are any issues. In a good case you both are messy or you both are neat. But when choosing a random roommate you don’t have much control over that.

The world of residence halls is a whole new experience for freshman at Illinois State University. We think that the residence halls are nice facilities but students could get the same experience if they were set up for apartment style or at least have a larger living space. All of the changes, conflicts and decisions that freshman face while living in the dorms are experiences and ways that will help them grow, help them learn how to overcome obstacles, and do things on their own in the end preparing them for the real world.