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Housing Decisions Loom Over Students

As freshmen and sophomores, students have little to worry about when it comes to where they can live on campus. The biggest concerns are usually meeting the new roommate and praying to make it into the Suites.

Because the idea of communal living stops sounds so appealing by your junior year, many students turn to campus apartments. However, the apartment options on campus are quite limited. Come February, many juniors shift into panic mode trying to find a place to live.

Otterbein's on campus apartment complexes, the Commons Apartments on Home St. and Park St., consist of 47 total units. Of the 47 units, 41 of them are four-person apartments, three are three-person apartments, two are two-person apartments and one apartment is a single, according to the Otterbein Web site.

Applications for Commons Apartments are due in February, and unless an apartment unit is full (one person per bedroom), students may not sign up for selection.

According to housing information from Student Affairs, "Only groups of full apartments may select an apartment. You may be placed individually on the Commons waitlist AFTER Commons selection takes place."

There are approximately 100 seniors and 80 juniors currently living in the Commons Apartments, according to Jeff Akers, assistant director of residence life and Commons hall director. Last year there were at least two groups of four students and several other individuals who did not make it into the Commons and were placed on the waitlist.

Not only is it highly unlikely to get an apartment on campus, unless you can find three other people to live with, but because priority is given to seniors, juniors sometimes don't make the cut.

Priority for room selection in residence halls is based on a point system. The system counts how many quarters you have lived in a residence hall and whether or not you participated in residence life surveys. Your name doesn't automatically make it to the top of the list simply due to class status.

For those who are left in the lurch and would rather not spend another year sharing the bathroom with total strangers, there is an abundance of affordable apartments and houses only minutes from campus. These residences can save you thousands of dollars and come with their own set of perks.

I found myself in this situation last year. Because I didn't have three other people to live with, could not afford to pay the outrageous $5,708 a year to live in the Commons and didn't feel like going back to communal living, my friend and I decided to live off campus.

By living off campus, I've not only saved over $1,000 so far this year, but I've also enjoyed free parking, having my own washer and dryer, being allowed to burn candles and incense as well as celebrating my 21st birthday without the fear of security knocking at my door (celebrating responsibly, of course).

Not to mention I'm building my own line of credit, learning responsibility before I graduate and feeling like I have some actual freedom.



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