Emma Daniel Many students receive a room assignment on campus but are then disappointed by their assigned room, building or roommate, but the Troy University housing department is ready to help. Troy’s main campus holds about 2,400 beds among the residence halls, Greek houses and married student apartments, according to Sabrina Foster, coordinator of housing and residence life. Before the year begins, all of those beds are full, but every year some students decide not to live on campus and some of those beds are left empty. “We start with zero spots left on paper, but that quickly changes,” said Sara Jo Burks, the assistant director of housing and residence life. “There’s a name in every bed space, usually. “But then you’ve got people that don’t show up, that didn’t cancel, and that bed space was held for them.” Once housing confirms these students will not be living in that room, it can assign the space to another student. Most of these changes happen before the add/drop date, according to the Clements Hall resident director Camri Martin-Bowen, a senior nursing major from Wetumpka. She said many of these students discover they cannot handle their classes or decide to save money by not living in the dorms. The greatest number of changes occur in the older dorms like Hamil and Gardner halls. Housing is still processing these cases, causing the number of empty beds on campus to vary over time, but this process gives hope to those who are not pleased with their rooms or who still want dorm rooms after the semester starts. “If you can hold out and give us a little time, oftentimes we can work it out, and we may have a bed space,” Burks said. “We have empty spaces usually within the first four weeks of school; that’s typical.” Unfortunately, a request to move is not a guarantee, said Martin-Bowen, but it may be easier than some would think. Although a move to a different building is a request that must be handled by the housing office, a move within a building can be handled by an RA as long as all the affected parties agree on the changes and Housing approves. “We are very student-friendly,” Burks said. “We work with people.” According to Burks, the housing office is focused on giving a space to those who need it, even after the beginning of the semester or to commuting students. Not many schools are this lenient, Burks said. “If we’ve got a space, we’ll allow you to come in,” she said. “There’s not a lot of places where you can walk in the middle of the semester and say, ‘I’m tired of this commute every day. Have you got anywhere?’ “We work very hard to try and house as many students as we possibly can.”
Staff Writer
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