Housing numbers for spring 2017 comparable to previous years

The start of the spring semester brought a decrease in students living on campus – 14 percent of residence hall beds are unoccupied at USD.

John Geske, USD’s housing director, said having this many beds unoccupied is normal for the second semester.

“Typically, most years see an attrition from spring to fall,” Geske said. “I’ve been looking at past years and is been nothing that is un-normal or unexpected.”

Geske said there are many different reasons for this decline in housing each spring semester, including students requesting their contracts be released, students who’ve dropped and students who decide to live off campus.

Geske said the spring decrease doesn’t result in no revenue loss, as the department plans for it in the budget each year.

“Every year before the year starts when we talk with our finance office partners and talk through what our trends look like for occupancy,” he said. “And based off our past data we anticipate attrition and plan our budget accordingly.”

Each semester a number of students end up living alone or having to find a new roommate. Rachel Edwards, a first-year student living in North Complex, recently had her roommate move out and is now living alone in her double room.

“It’s lonely because I miss having another friend, but I also like it because you don’t have to worry about someone else and their schedule you can just be alone for a little bit,” Edwards said.

Edwards said the university hasn’t yet contacted her about living by herself and hasn’t had to pay extra for living alone.

Geske said housing numbers are exactly where he thinks they should be, adding that USD usually never ends a year below the 80 percent-mark and continues to be fairly stable throughout the rest of the year.