Students lament scheduling of house picks during game

While most students spent Thursday night in front of their television sets rooting for the men's basketball team, others spent their night in the basement of the Gilbert-Addoms dormitory for single room picks.

Students had hoped Bill Burig, assistant dean of student development, would reschedule the housing selection. "We look at all calendars as best we can and establish the [housing] calendar a long way out," Burig said. "But the time of the game wasn't even announced until earlier this week."

Burig added that this year, housing picks have been condensed, and since several officials from the Office of Student Development must work on housing selection nights, it would have been difficult to rearrange the schedule.

Housing picks began at 7 p.m., about 40 minutes prior to the basketball game, which ended well before the selection process finished.

In the past several days, a few students contacted Burig requesting a television at the selection location or the rescheduling of the process.

"I understand how difficult it is to schedule housing picks not knowing when the basketball games are," sophomore Anne Warner said. "At the same time, there should be a way to reschedule the housing or push the time back to still have housing picks and watch the game."

Sophomore Megan Murphy agreed.

"I think it's probably something that the person who scheduled housing picks should've thought about," she said. "It's mandatory to attend selection, but everyone wants to watch the game, and even professors take that into consideration in scheduling tests."