UPDATE: August 26 at 4:34 p.m.
As of the morning of August 24, all 12 residents in temporary lounge housing were male, according to Sasha Gamburg, Housing and Dining's assistant director of operations. All of the females have been moved into permanent room assignments.
Original story
Some freshmen moving to AU this fall may have been surprised to learn they would not be moving into traditional dorm rooms.
A dozen students, as of August 23, are living in “temporary housing locations” in the Letts Sky Lounge and Anderson 2U, according to Sasha Gamburg, assistant director of operations for Housing and Dining. Originally, 30 students were in temporary housing at the start of move-in, as AU identified empty spaces in the residence halls.
“Each student in the floor lounges will have individual bed, desk, desk chair, and access to a shared clothing storage space,” Gamburg said in an email.
Housing and Dining had to find these temporary housing options because AU’s freshmen class was larger than anticipated, Gamburg said. Students were placed in these floor lounges based on their enrollment and housing deposit dates, so those who applied after May 1 were offered the temporary housing assignments in Letts and Anderson.
“They loved it because there was a lot of space,” Maggie Cassion, resident assistant on Letts 6 North, said of the girls who were temporarily housed in the Letts sky lounge. “If you see it, it’s like a big slumber party.”
Housing and Dining made the decision to temporarily house freshmen in lounges two to three weeks ago, and students were informed a day or two later via email, Gamburg said.
The incoming class includes 1,550 new freshmen and 310 transfer students, according to AU’s website.
Students living in these temporary housing assignments will be paying the rate of a triple room a credit of $11 per night for each night they live in a floor lounge, according to Gamburg. That credit can then be used to pay the students’ housing bill.
Housing and Dining hopes that every first-year student in permanent housing within the first few weeks of school.
In addition, Housing and Dining had to place temporarily residents in 182 triples. The Housing and Dining assignments team will work to de-triple these rooms once the students living in lounges have been given permanent housing arrangements, according to Gamburg.
Staff writers Heather Mongilio and Samantha Hogan contributed to this report.
