The Syracuse University Office of Housing, Meal Plan and I.D. Card Services has run out of space for students, prompting them to use the Sheraton SU Hotel and Conference Center for the second year in a row, and forcing some students off campus.

“We have had more participants than space allows,” Kelly Rodoski, news manager at Syracuse University, said in an email.

The housing lottery ended its sixth round April 9, but some students still don’t have housing and will wait for the results of the seventh round to find out where they’ll be living next year. Students still without housing must add themselves to a residence hall waitlist or South Campus waitlist, and will be placed randomly no later than July 15, according to a campus-wide SU Housing email.

Students who haven’t fulfilled their two-year housing requirement are guaranteed housing during the seventh round, and those who have lived on campus for two years or more are not guaranteed housing, according to SU Housing. Rodoski added that students who have already met the housing requirement could be forced to find off-campus housing.

For the 2014-15 school year, SU Housing is offering 32 rooms in the Sheraton, Rodoski said. The hotel currently houses 64 sophomores and two resident advisers. Next year, the Sheraton will house the same number of students, she said.

Rodoski said single rooms, three-person suites and two-person suites filled up the fastest, but she said that it’s more because of fewer rooms than any other reason. Incoming freshmen won’t have an issue getting housing because a certain number of rooms are reserved based on the number of students admitted, Rodoski said.

At press time, Rodoski was unable to answer where students under the mandatory two-year on-campus housing contract will be placed after they were closed out of the housing lottery.

Though the lottery system has not changed, some students were frustrated with the system’s arbitrary assignments. Natasha del Amo, a freshman public relations and political science dual major, said the university should factor students who are trying hard to maintain good grades into the system.

“It would be better if it was based off of GPA,” del Amo said.

Del Amo said she wanted a triple on main campus, but because of her selection time, she was unable to secure her first choice.  Instead, she and two of her friends will be living in a South Campus apartment.

Brittany Muller, a communications and rhetorical studies major and a first-year transfer student, had tried to get a two-person suite, but those options filled up before her time.

Muller decided to sign up for the open and split double round.  On April 7, she and her future roommate went to request each other, however, Muller said she received a message saying she was ineligible for the round.  Muller called SU Housing’s office to find out why, and she was told it was because she was a transfer student, not a first-year. Later that day, Muller received a call saying she would be put in the round for split and open doubles.

Published on April 15, 2014 at 1:48 am

Contact Caroline: cstrange@syr.edu