The Ol’ Dirty is reporting today that, similar to 2008-09, the UO has let in more freshmen than they have room for in housing. This time, instead of sending them across the river to live in Stadium Park, the UO admin has another plan:

Students are first notified that there isn’t enough room within University Housing. Then, they are invited via Facebook to join a specially created group called “UO Apartment/Roommate Connection.”

“Only the people we’ve identified who have registered for housing can join,” Shang said.

The University is also now affiliated with the new Courtside Apartments through Property Management Concepts, much like how the University entered an affiliation with Stadium Park Apartments in 2008-09 to help house incoming University freshmen.

It is impossible to look at this spike in enrollment outside of the state’s budget woes, and subsequently the University’s budget woes. Although the decisions on how many incoming students to enroll includes a multitude of factors, the bottom line is more students (particularly out of state students) = more money for the UO, and more leverage for further changes of University funding policy. (This includes Lariviere’s white paper, or other proposals.)

The whole Facebook thing is interesting, too. WOO SOCIAL MEDIA, and all that. I guess everyone has a Facebook now, especially young people, so it seems appropriate. And if you’re looking to create a networking community . . . I think the UO could probably set something up independently of Facebook, but there’s no guarantee kids will use it. Anyway, that’s not really the important part. I wonder who on Facebook invites these freshmen to this group. I hope it’s Richard Lariviere.

Finally, Kat includes some interesting facts at the end of her story:

The residence halls have the capacity to hold about 3,700 students, 3,000 of which are freshmen. The University intentionally limited freshmen enrollment to 3,765 in 2009, but in 2008, freshmen enrollment was at a record high of 4,205, which put further stress on University Housing and led to the Stadium Park agreement.

P.S. Where is Amelie’s Housing Advocate Amanda Hilts on this issue? Isn’t this, like, her job?

This entry was posted on Monday, July 26th, 2010 at 11:53 by Lyzi Diamond and is filed under Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.