Housing Lottery for the 2008–2009 Academic Year

Lottery for Second-Year Students Living in Residence Halls
At the request of the Residence Hall Association Senate, in November 2007 the Department of Resident Life announced that a lottery, or purely random drawing of the names of current second-year students living in residence halls, will determine the order in which these students will be considered for residence hall housing next year. The lottery will be in force from November 2007 to September 1, 2008, the period of time in which the actual number of these students who can be accommodated in residence halls for Fall 2008 will become known.

Why a Lottery?
The need for the lottery arises from two considerations.

First, Resident Life projects that – for the first time -- some but not all interested students in a particular category (in this instance, students now in their second year of college, for whom Fall 2008 will be their third year in college) will be notified next April 1 that they can choose rooms and roommates for Fall 2008 during Room Selection meetings that will be conducted later in that month of April. Resident Life’s initial projections have been that most second-year students who seek Fall 2008 residence hall housing will have to be wait-listed in April 2008 and will remain uncertain of their residence hall housing status as the summer approaches.

Second, no method has existed for determining access to residence halls within a group of students, such as current second-year students. A lottery has been chosen as this method. The existing priority for room selection procedure (a system of awarding points and calculating a Priority Number for every student) is not meant to determine access to residence halls and will not be used to do so. Priority Numbers will be assigned every April to eligible students and will continue to determine the order in which eligible students choose their rooms and roommates.

For more information
If you have any questions or problems, please do not hesitate to contact us at reslife@umd.edu or by calling our office at (301) 314-2100 Monday to Friday, 8:30am to 4:30pm.