In years past, on campus housing for upperclass students at WPI gave priority to students that had earned the greatest number of academic credits. Last year, the opening of Messenger Hall gave the administration the opportunity to make sophomores priority in that particular building. This year, sophomore priority has spread to several other buildings across campus.

According to the WPI housing selection webpage, sophomores will be given priority in Messenger Hall, the fourth floor of Founders Hall, Trowbridge House, Faraday Hall, Ellsworth Apartments, and Fuller Apartments. Juniors and seniors will be given the opportunity to select any spaces left vacant by sophomores, and the spaces in East Hall or Salisbury Estates.

The spaces allotted for sophomore priority would allow for nearly double the amount of sophomores to live on campus when compared to juniors and seniors. Over 500 second year students would be given slots for on-campus housing due to the sophomore priority. There would be fewer than 400 slots left over for juniors and seniors combined.

The spaces allocated for sophomore priority also encompass the cheapest on-campus housing options, Fuller and Ellsworth Apartments, as well as Messenger, which is the most centrally-located. If the sophomores were to fill all the spaces where priority was given, the juniors and seniors would only have two options: East Hall, which is only just down the hill, or Salisbury Estates, which typically requires long walks or shuttle rides. Both of those options are also among the more expensive housing styles on campus.

This year, the selection process has also been randomized within student’s class year and group size. This means that upper class students that have patiently waited to climb the credit-ranking system designed to give the hardest workers the most opportunity, now may be pushed to the bottom of their selection period. Some of those students may have already had to settle for less than their ideal housing situation in the past, and will now be asked to settle again due to this randomization.

This new housing selection process is flawed, and seems to be based on accommodating the sophomore class, rather the accommodating the interests of upperclass students on the whole. Last year’s process was fair, giving the students with the most credits invested at WPI the first pick at housing, and reserving only one space for a particular class year. This year’s process is concerning to some of the older students that wish to remain on campus, since the selection appears to be partial to sophomores, and may encourage more of them to remain on campus, effectively pushing out older students. Residential services should be trying to address the needs of all students when it comes to housing selection, and this new method is not doing so effectively.