In Spring 2023, there were 82 rooms remaining after upperclass draw ended. This year, there were 17.
On Monday, April 1, upperclass students began the draw process into the 696 rooms available on Princeton’s campus. The process started at 9:30 a.m. that morning and lasted through 1:48 p.m. on Wednesday, April 10. Room draw into residential colleges and for independent upperclass students was completed on Thursday, March 28, after room draw for New College West was repeated due to technical difficulties.
The Daily Princetonian downloaded multiple lists of the available rooms on the Housing Portal each day for the eight days room draw took place. Similar to last year, students significantly preferred fewer roommates.
Singles were once again the most popular room size, dramatically decreasing in number over the first four days. Upperclass draw began with 351 singles available to upperclass students on April 1. By the time groups solely composed of juniors began drawing on April 5, there were around 39 available. According to the available room lists, around three hours into the rising junior draw, no more singles were available.
“Our original plan was to stay [in our residential college],” Janny Eng ’25, who drew in a group ninth overall in the upperclass draw, said. “We wanted singles, and we thought it’d be our best bet,” she said. When she discovered the news that her group had randomly been assigned a good draw time, she noted that they “started looking at other areas on campus” and broadened her search for singles across campus.
At the beginning of the draw, Scully Hall and Pyne Hall had the first and second most rooms available respectively with 104 and 102 rooms available. The two halls were also the most popular among drawn rooms early on. Around half of the rooms in each hall were taken by the end of the third day — one full day prior to the beginning of the rising junior draw.
When looking at the first halls to run out of rooms, Scully Hall filled its rooms first followed by Dod Hall and Wright Hall — two halls considered to be in a more central campus location.
“The first thing — obviously avoid construction,” Ally Robertson ’26 said. “I wanted to be close to the Arc[hitecture] building … and close to Frist.” Within her draw group, “the one that wants [a room] more south on campus is an athlete.”
Robertson was on the final page of the room draw times list alongside five members of her draw group. They originally planned for two triples, but no triples were available at their draw time. At their draw time of 1:39 p.m. on April 10, the available room list had not been updated since 10:11 a.m. that morning.
“Construction is actually a pretty big factor,” Pippa LaMacchia ’26 said. “I have friends in upperclass [student] housing who are woken up at seven in the morning every day because of construction.”
LaMacchia drew with two others on the final time of the upperclass draw.
The average square footage of different room types was consistently smaller day after day. If an upperclass student was drawing a single on the last day they were available, the single was an average of 46 square feet smaller than those available at the start of the draw.
“Obviously I want a bigger room — but if I can get a single, that’s all that matters,” Robertson said.
Parker Hill ’25 and her two draw-mates utilized their first pick to get a spacious room in Wright Hall, notably a less popular hall. In weighing their options, the group “sorted by square footage.”
“We found out once we had the first [draw] time that so many good rooms are actually unavailable,” Hill said. “A lot of our senior friends that have great rooms, we looked them up and they were not on the list.”
For those who were unable or didn’t draw into a room during their draw time, the waitlist is accepting applications through the deadline of April 29. The order of the waitlist is determined by original room selection time and housing will be assigned around mid-July. Housing is guaranteed for all undergraduates.
Vincent Etherton is a contributing Data writer for the ‘Prince.’
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
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