Student Housing Business is the voice of the student housing industry.
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STUDENT OPINION JULY/AUGUST 2015 STUDENT HOUSING BUSINESS .COM 72 THE DIFFERENCE IS ON THE INSIDE A rising sophomore at Penn describes his experience living in the Quad, a group of residence halls with Gothic design that look like the classic interpretation of college living. By Torin Di Salvo I I realized I knew almost nothing about what it was like to live alone as I prepared for freshman year. When it came time to submit my preferences for housing at the University of Pennsylvania, almost every person I asked had the same piece of advice: "Make sure you get the Quad." The Quad at Penn is one of those iconic places on campus that you can see in the school's brochure, with a sunset background and too much Photoshop edit- ing. Situated in the center of campus, it features 19th Century Cope & Stewardson "Collegiate Gothic" architecture and clusters housing for almost 1,500 freshmen around a number of courtyards. It is aesthetically perfect and I was fortunate enough to be assigned to live there. Unfortunately, however, much the love I had for the exterior of the building faded after I entered its doors. At frst, I couldn't quite understand the obsession with the Quad. When I looked at my two-person room, I saw a roughly nine- foot by 15-foot design with limited amenities, no private bathroom and almost no open space. Considering the fact that the closest dining hall and my classes were several blocks away, I feared that I had been misled by the hype and had made a decision that was going to devastate my freshman year. Within a few days of settling into my room, however, I conceded that maybe I had judged too quickly. For one, it was August, and the room had central air conditioning. As a stu- dent athlete at the school, I appreciated the comfort, as many of my teammates faced sweltering heat that is not favorable to mus- cle recovery or to the odor of athletic gear. Further comforting was the small sink that was conveniently located by my door. I, like many going into college, initially dreaded the idea of not having a personal bathroom. However, unlike students in other dorms who had to clean their private facilities, the com- mon bathrooms were well maintained by the school staf. The sink allowed me to do many of the things that I could with a full bathroom, and this turned out to be an ideal situation. Other niceties were the dorm's tight security, convenient study and computer rooms, small café and open courtyard areas. It took me the majority of the school year, however, before I realized what truly made the Quad the best place to live. For many of the academic breaks, I was required to stay on campus in order to attend practice and train- ing. In particular, during spring break, we remained in the dorm while most other stu- dents went home or on vacation. All of a sud- den, the comfort that the building once ofered vanished, and I was able to put my fnger on what was missing — the other students. For 18 year olds who have just gone away to school, many friendships that took years to build are gone. First-year students have to replace old friends and family relationships with new ones, something that can be hard to do in a place where every student is compet- ing against their neighbors. In that way, focus on developing a social environment, for me, took priority over stressing about the aesthetic environment in which I lived. Being in a place that facilitated these social environments by encouraging interaction helped me to develop new support networks that are necessary for both academic and social success. In a way, the tougher living conditions that I once feared produced even more interaction between students. Things like having to wear fip fops to shower or remember a key just to use the bathroom became conversation starters and were much easier to endure with friends as opposed to anonymous residents. Rooms in the Quad are small, so many of the people I lived with spent time in the lounges on each foor. The lounge on our foor was nothing special and did not have any more space than the rooms, but it had a few couches, a TV, and a desk. This was good enough to get us out of our rooms. The small café and the courtyards all served the same purpose — another place for students to gather and socialize. This social ground fostered new friendships which were not only the high- light of my housing experience, but my freshman year as a whole. Recently, while refecting on one of the most memo- rable and enjoy- able years of my life, I attempted to understand why my housing had such a big impact on my experi- ence on a deeper level than just through the friendships I made and the amenities that the physical building ofered. In many ways college housing, especially that of freshman year, is the brief bufer between the protec- tive environment of a student's childhood and their independent adulthood. Living in the Quad gave me a chance to experience many of the responsibilities of living alone, without overwhelming me with all of them simultaneously. Now that I am planning to live of campus next year, I have quickly had to learn things like how to negotiate rent, set up utilities, and manage a lease. Having lived a year on campus, I am confdent that I am ready for these challenges. Freshmen students who have just left home for the frst time, however, are not ready to take all of this on at once, which makes on-campus housing so important. My dorm provided me with many new responsibilities, but not quite all of them. Simultaneously, it surrounded me with people facing identical scenarios and facilitated my interaction with them. These people, many of whom I will never forget, helped to bring the beauty of the Quad that I once revered from its exterior, into the walls that I will always know as home. SHB Torin Di Salvo is a rising sophomore at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. l t h j t t h h t h TORIN DI SALVO