Gonzalez, Residence Life reintroduce consolidation process for on-campus living
The pre-COVID-19 policy is back for the 2022-2023 academic year.
This fall, the Bethel College Residence Life office has implemented a consolidation process for on-campus living spaces. This means that residents without a roommate will be expected to find one.
If they fail to do so on their own, then a mandatory reassignment will occur or a roommate will automatically be assigned to the room. If either of these options are unavailable for whatever reason, the occupant will be required to pay the single-rate charge.
Room consolidation was a regular process for Bethel’s dormitories prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, Bethel is reintroducing it.
“It’s definitely a practice that’s in the handbook,” coordinator for residence life Chywonna Gonzalez said. “It’s a policy and it’s something that we needed to really start to focus on. It was less likely we enforced it during the pandemic — we didn’t force people to consolidate.”
With room occupancy and the consolidation practice being more of a focus for Gonzalez’s team this year, it makes a person occupying a double occupancy space approximately 50% more than the double rate.
“Definitely at the beginning of the school year Haury Hall is more impacted, especially if the numbers are uneven,” Gonzalez said. “We don’t try to put students in Haury [Hall] without roommates. We try to pair them up as best as we can. But if we have an odd number, obviously somebody gets left out.”
With the spring semester only three months away, residents of Warkentin Court and Voth Hall can expect to be affected by consolidation. Bethel administration is expecting an uptick in transfers ahead of the second semester — and it’s already eyeing options for housing those students in said locations.
“Existing students will have the choice to move in with each other so that [transfer students] don’t have to move into that space,” Gonzalez said. That's when students will have to decide if they want to pay for a double occupancy space.