“Housing Expo 2004” gave Boston University students a look at on-campus housing options Wednesday, just two days before Friday’s deadline to submit a $500 housing guarantee payment.
Tables with representatives from all campus residences lined the walls of the George Sherman Union’s second and third floors, where students viewed floor plans and asked questions about each residence.
A surge of students spilled into the expo at its start and formed lines in front of the Office of Housing table to turn in their residence license agreements and deposits.
While WTBU DJs played background tunes, students clutching free cotton candy and soda gathered informational handouts and asked residence directors and resident assistants questions.
Many of the tables had themes to portray student life in the residences. Warren Towers Area Director Karen Belanger stood by a table covered with dollar bills and a bejeweled model of the three towers. She said her table’s theme was “hip-hop, bling-bling.”
“Our goal is to demonstrate the staff’s enthusiasm for the building … so people don’t have the misconception that people are ‘stuck’ in Warren,” she said. “Someone actually asked me if they were crazy to move from South to Warren.”
The Student Residences at 10 Buick St. displayed a “Viva La$ Village” theme and featured a computer presentation of the Student Village’s future look, which included Agganis Arena and the Fitness and Recreation Center.
10 Buick St. Residence Director Laura DeVeau, who was dressed in a gold-studded Elvis costume, said when students asked what their chances of scoring a crib in the Village are, she could only say, “Housing is a gamble.”
“Go to your housing appointment being prepared, know what you want, be on time and have a back-up plan,” she said.
Though some students said the expo was informational, others said the housing representatives were not knowledgeable.
CAS student Suneet Purohit said he enjoyed the free food but did not get much else out of the expo.
“I think they over-hyped it,” he said. “The [residence representatives] were not very informed and they just gave us papers.”
Some students said looking at South Campus apartment floor plans was frustrating.
“A lot of people want to get into South, so the line makes it hard to look,” College of General Studies sophomore Iheanyi Ahykanna said.
College of Communication sophomore Carolina Cruz said she was only able to look at the floor plans for five apartments after waiting in line for 20 minutes.
“We were in there like five minutes and they said, ‘Your time’s up,'” she said.
Cruz said she would need hours to look at floor plans to assess her options and plans to go to South Campus’ Office of Residence Life at a later date.
CAS junior Elizabeth Fanning said students can be mislead by the information at the expo.
“You don’t know what they’ll have available so [the Housing Expo] isn’t an accurate idea of what will be available once housing selection comes around,” she said.
Though on-campus housing agreements are due Friday, students will not be mailed lottery numbers and room selection appointment times until April, according to the Office of Housing’s website. Lottery numbers determine when a student can sit down with housing staff to select a room, and seniors get the lowest numbers and the first appointments.
The lottery system will continue for now because there are no plans to put the room selection process online, Housing Director Marc Robillard said. In-person appointments allow housing staff to hold apartments while students discuss their options and give them more time to decide than an online selection appointment would, he said.
Robillard said he expects more off-campus apartments to be available this year because people are moving around to find jobs because of the slow economy. However, he said he is not doing anything to keep students from living off campus because there is an overflow of students who want on-campus housing.
“The benefit of living on campus is students have a higher [grade point average], a better social life and they’re safer,” he said.
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