Saturday Q&A: Roommate Selection

Saturday Q&A

Frequently Asked Questions from Our Tours...

Every week we'll post answers to prospective students' questions. Some will be FAQs from tours, like this week, and others will be responses to comments and emails received via this blog. If you have a question about a post we've covered previously, comment to ask us for more information. Have we not covered it yet? Email us at UVaSummer14@virginia.edu and we'll reply with an answer!

Can you talk a little about the roommate selection process?

You are required to live on Grounds during your first year here at UVa, and although you can apply to live in a single room, a majority of students will indeed be living with a roommate. There are three ways you can go about choosing a roommate and as a first year student, getting the “perfect” roommate might be high on your list of priorities, but research actually shows that regardless of how you pick your roommate, the overall success rate is just about the same.

When choosing a roommate, you can pick someone that you already have a relationship with, someone that you meet and get to know on-line or you can simply choose to allow the University to randomly assign you a roommate. If you already have a relationship with a someone coming into the University, all you have to do is put their name down on the housing application and, granted he/she puts your name down as well, you two will be matched up to share a room. Nowadays, many students choose to meet and get to know other incoming students over social networks like Facebook and Twitter, maybe meet up once or twice, and ultimately choose to room with one another.  Lastly, students may also choose to allow the University to match them up with another first year student based on their living preference. If you decide you want to be randomly assigned a roommate, you will fill out a survey that will ask you about your study habits, living preferences, (are you a morning or night person?), etc., and based on your answers, you will be matched up with a student with similar living habits.

Regarless of whether you're living with your best friend of 6 years or a brand new person, living with a roomate is such a valuable experience to have, as you're bound to pick up a few life lessons about compromise and communication along the way, and its helpful to know that you're living with someone going through many of the same changes and experiences you are as a first year student.

--Belén Osman