One of the key ingredients needed in a very large school environment is a sense of community and connectedness. We sometimes refer to this as “being known by the name” as opposed to a number. Particularly for freshmen who attend large universities, being known by your name or having a sense of connectedness with others on your campus can make or break the decision to return for the sophomore year. Your freshman roommate plays a critical role in how you transition to college and whether you feel connected.

Role of the Freshman roommate

Given the importance that the freshman roommate plays in the quality of life freshman year of college, I was disappointed to learn that Ohio State University is moving toward an automated system for roommate matching. In the past, the 9,900 students who lived on campus were matched by the experienced hand of the housing administration director. The director mentioned in a local campus newspaper that it would take her about five weeks to match new students with their roommate. The students were matched based on their responses to a questionnaire.

A great quote from the assistant director for Housing Services was that, “Not always will the outcome be perfect or anything, but it makes the students feel like a person instead of just a number on campus.” That’s just the message you want to send to the thousands of new students coming to a campus which is equivalent to the population of a city!

After 27 years of the current housing administration director matching students by hand, OSU will now have computerized roommate matching beginning this summer. In the past, the housing department would receive less than 0.2 percent request for roommate changes. Do you think the campus will be able to maintain this strong satisfaction with the computer-generated matches?