Ryan Sanders was returning from studying abroad in Munich when he applied to live off-campus for spring 2011.

“I thought I would be approved because I was almost 22,” said Sanders. “I had senior credits, I didn’t have any judicial violations, and I wrote this really long essay about why I should be allowed to live off-campus.”

Sanders was not approved to live off-campus. So, he tried again.

“I got documentation from the Financial Aid Office showing that I had a lot of debt from student loans and that it would be beneficial financially for me to live off-campus,” said Sanders. “Campus Life still said no.”

While we do not all have stories like Sanders’, every traditional student at Guilford has to deal with housing applications, deadlines, and the lottery at some point. The process began in February, and will continue until every student is housed — which may be as late as July.

“It is a long process,” said Associate Dean for Campus Life Jen Agor. “This allows us to check on and fix glitches, and it allows students to do everything they need to do, like clear holds and pick roommates.”

Finding roommates can be a more difficult aspect of the housing process. With this in mind, Campus Life will hold a roommate mixer on Wednesday, March 23, said Residential Living Coordinator Kris Gray. At this event, students without roommates can connect with each other.

According to Gray, the general process for being housed has not changed much in the past several years. Students select roommates and apply for housing and meal plans through BannerWeb.

Students who want to live in a theme house or Hodgins Retreat must fill out a paper application. New for this year are paper applications for Pope House and mixed-gender suites in Bryan Hall.

“The paper applications are as much for approval from Campus Life as they are for simple computer purposes,” said Gray. She explained that the applications are necessary to ensure, for example, that everyone applying to live in Hodgins is a junior or senior.

The paper applications to live off-campus have been around for a while, but this year, there are increased restrictions for who can live off campus.

“The new system is actually more like what we had in place several years ago,” said Agor. “When our enrollment numbers were up, we didn’t have room to house everybody, so we relaxed the restrictions and made it easier for people to get approved. Now we have the space, but the approval process is so subjective that it’s hard to explain why one person may be approved and another denied.”

Gray does not foresee a change in the number of applications to live off-campus or in the number of people who are approved.

“Essentially all we’ve done is made the process more black and white,” said Gray.

“The process will be clearer and fairer,” said Agor.

Sanders approves of the revised requirements for off-campus approval.

“I like that it has been reformed to be clearer,” said Sanders. “I probably would have been approved to live off campus under the reformed system.”

Nevertheless, Sanders is on campus now, and plans to stay on-campus until he graduates.

“I realized that I do want to be a part of the on-campus community,” said Sanders. “I like being on-campus and being close to everything.”