About College Dorm Room Decor

Beginning your college years by living in a dorm room can add to the experience. Whether your experience will be positive or negative depends on how well-prepared you are to make very close living quarters work with a relative stranger. Most people graduate from college with at least one room mate becoming a close friend for life, and say they're glad they lived on campus rather than in other housing.

Benefits

Living on campus in a dorm means your social life expands because you get to know many more people than someone who only takes a few classes. Gym workouts and swimming, film festivals and concerts are easily accessible, and generally you don't have to have a car to enjoy college life. Libraries with thousands of volumes are also at your fingertips, and while standard meals may be unexciting, there aren't any dishes to wash.

Function

Studying and sleeping are the main two functions of your dorm room. After that, the room needs to provide space so both of you can get cleaned up and dressed for class every day, fix a snack, have a friend over at a convenient time, exercise, watch TV or listen to music, and have privacy for phone calls. You'll also need to sort laundry, make the beds and keep your stuff separated from your roommate's.

Features

Furnished with two or three single beds, one or two closets, perhaps a sink, built-in desks and shelves, and not enough electrical outlets, dorm rooms typically lack much style. Usually located right on the college campus, most people can walk or catch a bus or van to get to their classes. Newer colleges have discarded the phys-ed locker room type of bathrooms and built dorms with more privacy for toilets and showers.

Types

Ranging from a studio apartment for one person to a three-bed barracks-style bare room, dorm rooms run the gamut. The dorm buildings are usually large, with two or more floors, a security system and one door plus one or two windows per room. A dorm room can be completely furnished, even to the bed coverings, or you may be able to bring quite a few items from home, including lamps, microwave and small refrigerator.

Significance

Having a place where you can rest, sleep and study is going to be of the utmost importance while you're in college. If your room mate has friends running in and out a lot, or the people next door have loud fights or constant parties, your grades will suffer accordingly. You can come down with more colds and headaches too, if you're not getting enough sleep or putting up with too much stress.

Warning

Talk to your future room mate before you move in. Email your likes and dislikes to each other, plan class schedules together and be open and honest about what you can't stand: sharing clothes, loud alarm clocks, whatever. If she needs to practice her French horn for hours, and you like to sleep late and have afternoon classes, you both will have to make adjustments. Figuring you can stand anything for only eight hours a night won't work.

Resources

• Great checklist for what you need
• Good ideas and other lists to use