By Rachel Makabi
DAILY BRUIN SENIOR STAFF
[email protected]
Students are hoping that they will now have more say on
decisions made on the Hill after getting new policies to improve
communication between them and housing officials.
In order to guarantee more student input, and to prevent the
resentment that ensued after the consolidation edict issued late
last quarter, housing officials met with Policy Review Board
members to institute new policies geared toward garnering more
student ideas before decisions are made.
The consolidation policy forced students with vacancies to move
out, find a new roommate, or pay more money to update their
contracts from a triple to double, or double to single.
Both On Campus Housing chair Adam Harmetz and Office of
Residential Life director Alan Hanson said they are hopeful
officials can gather more student input as a result of the
meeting.
“I am confident that (housing officials) really care for
student input.”
At the meeting, officials and PRB members decided to:
“¢bull; Have a Housing Assignments administrator on PRB,
allowing students to speak directly to officials about
assignments.
“¢bull; Involve ORL staff, including residents assistants and
resident directors, in meetings to talk about recommendations
“¢bull; Have a student representative on the Housing Assignments
board.
Hanson said officials apologized for not involving students in
the consolidation decision.
“We would have felt much better had we had a commission to
consult with our student leadership,” Hanson said.
Having student input would present creative alternatives to
policies like consolidation, Harmetz said.
For example, housing officials could have given students with
vacancies in their rooms an incentive to move out by paying them
for it, he said.
“That way, everyone is happy,” he continued.
Because most of the conflicts of the year ““ such as
consolidation and having students in study lounges ““ stemmed
from the housing assignments office, having a student
representative will hopefully improve the situation, Harmetz
said.
Housing officials and students came to an understanding that
student preferred more triples to students living in study lounges,
Harmetz said.
Though housing officials agree with Harmetz that increasing
triples will solve problems of overcrowding in the residence halls,
Hanson said some students may still live in doubles next year while
others may live in study lounges because returning students who
requested doubles for this year will probably get them.
“We will make as many triples as possible and we are
trying to minimize the assignments of students to the
lounges,” Hanson said. “But it is not something we can
control until we know all the student admission numbers and the
yields that these produce.”