Finding a Roommate, Requesting Them and then Living Together!
The scene: Boxes are scattered all over the floor, contents spilling out. The closet is packed with clothes, and the rest are in a pile on the floor. Stereos, televisions, CD storage boxes and computers crowd desktops, dressers and even the beds. Students survey the utter confusion, each thinking, "Now what do we do?" The summer is over and it's finally move-in day!
Part of the excitement of going away to college is getting to know new people, and some of the first people you will meet are your roommates. Sharing a living space is an important educational experience because it helps students adjust to new situations, exposes them to different kinds of people, teaches them how to resolve conflicts, and improves communication skills. Your roommates may come from different backgrounds, lifestyles or parts of the world. They may be complete strangers, friends or acquaintances from home. In any case, your relationship with these people will be unique.
Meeting new people and feeling like you “fit in” makes a difference in your transition to college life. Residence Life is here to help make this transition a sucessful and memorable one. 
Requesting a Roommate
OPTION 1)
If you know someone you'd like to live with, submit a mutual roommate request by July 1 for the Fall semester. Roommate information will be made availabe mid-July and can be viewed online through Student Link. As soon as you receive your roommate information, we encourage you to make contact. Room and roommate assignments will not be changed after roommate information is posted.
We cannot guarantee assignment with a requested roommate, even if that request is mutual. Our ability to accommodate a mutual roommate request, however, is enhanced when the students requesting to live together are flexible with respect to their residence hall assignment. On the application, you will be required to tell us whether your roommate request(s) (if any) or your residence hall preferences is/are more important to you.
If you 1) tell us that your roommate request is most important to you, 2) that request is mutual, and 3) your requested roommate also indicates that their roommate request is most important to her/him, we will try our best to assign you to the same room. Based on space availability, we will still consider your residence hall preferences, but you may be assigned or reassigned to a residence hall not among your preferences if that is the only way we can accommodate your mutual roommate request.
If you tell us that your residence hall preferences are most important to you, we will do our best, based on space availability, to assign you in accordance with those preferences. If you have a mutual roommate request, we will then do our best to assign you together only if space is available to do so in the residence hall to which you are assigned.
OPTION 2)
If you don't put down a roommate request, Residence Life will assign you a roommate based only on smoking preference, as listed on a student's housing application.
Please note: all of the residence halls are smoke-free. Students who wish to smoke may do so as long as they are at least 50 ft away from the door.
OPTION 3)
An online option is available for you to meet other new UA students and potentially find a roommate. It is called: Arizona.RoommateClick.com and is available to you from December 1, 2008 until June 15, 2009.
Arizona.RoommateClick.com is a non-University service. You'll work directly with Arizona.RoommateClick.com. Here is a quick overview on how you might benefit from this new, optional service:
- Only admitted UA students who have applied for campus housing can use this service; you'll receive a separate ID and password
- Yearly, nonrefundable fee of $20 paid to Arizona.RoommateClick.com
- Complete and submit your online profile; in includes your interests, your hall assignment, major, and lots more details. You can include photos.
- Check other students’ profiles and you may communicate with potential roommates through the service.
- Submit up to three names for potential roommates to RoommateClick.com who will submit them to Residence Life
- You can revise or rebuild your “search” any time until mid-June.
Residence Life does not control the profiles, searches or submittals. Only mutual requests will be considered. We cannot guarantee you'll be placed with one of your requested roommates, but we will do our best to try and meet your request. RoommateClick.com is not a UA or Residence Life service.
If you have already created your profile on Arizona.RoommateClick.com, you can go directly to their website.
Roommate requests may be made for the Spring semester, but are not guaranteed. You will receive your room and roommate information at check-in.
Requests are not considered based on race, color, religion, gender, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, perceived socioeconomic status, or perceptions based on personal profiles/information found on the Internet.
Tips to Successfully Navigate the Roommate Experience
Roommate Relationships Come in All Shapes and Sizes
Some roommates become very good friends, choosing to socialize and study together. Others become friends but spend time outside the room with different social groups. Still others do not become friends but accept each other as roommates and live compatibly together for the year. Remember that you will meet many students other than your roommate. In addition to your hallmates, you will make friends through classes, sports, work, and other student activities.
Living together in one room, especially if you have never had a roommate before (or lately), requires work! The type of relationship you develop with your roommate depends in part on your expectations of the relationship, as well as on how effectively you communicate those expectations to your roommate from the very beginning.
As you think about your roommate and how you hope to interact, (regardless of how well or little you may know him/her) both of you should consider the following:
- Communicate! This is the most effective tool for living together happily.
- What do each of you expect of your relationship with your roommate?
- What can you and your roommate discuss to prevent potential problems?
- How much of your personal or life experiences are each of you willing to share?
- How do you both intend to discuss habits, values, and priorities?
- Could some of your practices or activities be potentially offensive or annoying to the other person?
- How will both of you resolve disagreements?
- How do you act when you are angry, depressed, stressed, or happy? How do you expect your roommate to behave when you are feeling any of these emotions? Share this with each other.
- Which of your belongings can and cannot be borrowed?
- When are visitors and/or friends welcome? For how long?
- How neat do you both expect the room to be?
- What study habits will make both of you successful students?
- Be ready to make compromises. You can't have everything your way all the time.
- Always treat your roommate with respect. Think about how you would feel if the roles were reversed.
- Attempt to make contact during the summer to plan the upcoming year.
- Review the Community Standards (quiet hours, alcohol use, guest and visitation regulations, etc.)
Once you arrive on campus, check in and start setting in, you will be given a Roommate Agreement Form. Both you and your roommate are expected to fill the form out together. Your RA and Community Director are there as resources to help you through the form if needed. On your Roommate Agreement Form you will indicate your preferences regarding sleep, study, and social time. As you adjust to life at The UA and take advantage of the new opportunities available to you, you may find that these preferences change. Be open with your roommate, communicating your needs; be responsive to your roommate, recognizing that he/she is changing too. Expect the best!
The communication skills you can develop in an effective roommate relationship are among the most valuable skills you will gain at college for your personal and professional life. The happiest of roommates will experience conflict at times. The key to success at those times is for roommates to communicate with each other - with the assistance of a staff member as necessary - about how to reach a resolution that is satisfactory to both roommates. We also strongly encourage you to utilize the Roommate Agreement Form.
