I put this on my Facebook but it’s too good to avoid talking about in detail. Boston University has opened a 25 story luxury dorm building for undergrads. The Boston Globe has a feature on it, which you can read here: BU Dorm Offers a Study in Luxury
There seems to be conflicting information about how much it costs but the article references one student who is paying $13,000 a semester to live in this new dorm building, featuring private baths and all the amenities you’d imagine a deluxe dorm to have. Communal bathrooms? Nope. Loud music? Nope – they have sound-proof rooms for that. Big plasma televisions in the common room with plush seating? Yep. Scenic views of the Charles River? Yep.
And now I will list my problems with this:
- $13,000 for living arrangements for one semester means paying about $3,700 a month for a roof over your head and a place to study. How much do you all pay a month to live in your apartments? Is it $3,700?
- How is this preparing students for the real world? Unless you are that top tier of students who immediately hit the jackpot out of college, this is not the life you can expect after graduation. This was one of my biggest complaints about Emerson (who it seems is going the same direction as BU), that not enough is done to get students ready to become responsible functional adults.
- In the article, some BU officials say that this dorm was erected to provide housing to any student that wants it. Yes, that is why you build a luxury dorm only rich people can afford, to provide more access for your students.
- One of the girls interviewed said she’s paying the cost of living in this new dorm with financial aid. Just think about that one for a little bit.
Finally, I think the best point to be made about this new dorm was in a comment left on the article on Boston.com:
As an unemployed alumna, I have to say this makes it difficult to take the fund-raising appeals seriously.
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I’m not saying that Boston University is the big, evil bad here but it is an alarming path that these colleges are going down. It’s one thing to have high tuition and living costs because of better education and an urban setting. But things like this are just going to result in only the super rich or super lucky being able to experience going to college in the city and from a person who couldn’t stand the idea of going to school in hillbilly country, that’s gotta be considered in some way.
Someone made a correction in the comments: It should be 13K a year. But still.
“As an unemployed alumna, I have to say this makes it difficult to take the fund-raising appeals seriously.”
I thought that too, but usually the funds for building come from a separate fund. I know with Emerson, you can specify what your gifts go to. But I agree that the money could be better spent.
Maybe I’m too close to the issue, but it doesn’t really bother me. First, it is 13k a year which comes out to be around 1550 per month. Sure, you can find cheaper apartments, but it is basically a luxury building so you are getting what you pay for and it’s not outrageous in terms of Boston apartment rates. More than I would pay, but not crazy. It is crazy and stupid for that girl to pay with financial aid though. : )
Second, BU like many schools is trying to give all students the ability to live on campus so they had to build more dorms. That’s what they meant by “provide housing to any student that wants it.” They meant any student who wants to stay in campus housing now can because they have enough dorm rooms with the addition of this building. There are plenty of more affordable (for college) room options for students to choose if they want to live on campus and don’t want to pay for StuV.
If you need to build another dorm building, why not build a nice one? The only way to get juniors and seniors to choose to live on campus (which is what the “city” and “neighbors” always push for) is to make it more attractive than living off campus and that means it needs to be nice. T
Third, having nice facilities attracts new students which keeps the school running.
I do agree that it should be have some of sliding pay scale depending on your financial situation, but that would be hard to administer and would probably result in everyone having to pay more for their rooms to spread out the cost. This way, people can choose their dorms according to their financial situations, which is the way it works in real life.
As for the fundraising, you know I hate fundraising, but isn’t that the point of fundraising? To improve the school? Better facilities attract students, more students mean more jobs for instructors and staff (the community). Ultimately it leads to more money that they can use to hire better instructors, update the library, etc. Also, as Laura says, I don’t think building costs are usually paid for with fundrasing money or at least mostly not with that. Plus, like she says, you could also specify that it NOT go to that if you are against it.
Anyway. I’m done now. 🙂 That was way longer than I intended.
-That’s 1550 a month for people who are, at best, working part-time while attending school. No one but the financially benefited students would be able to do that.
-Providing housing to anyone who wants it by creating a super luxury dorm that only a select few can live in, pushing everyone else to the older dorms. They’re creating/reinforcing a class system within the student body. Why not build a new dorm that is really good but not this over the top and then improve the existing dorms? Plus, the school is in a city. Part of the bargain of attending these schools is knowing when you go in that you might not have housing for all 4 years. I used to be angry about that but now I understand it more.
-Having nice facilities does attract new students but let me ask this: how many times have we talked about Emerson and their film program? That’s what drove up the cost of the tuition for every student yet only the film students used that high quality equipment. Didn’t that make you guys a bit upset? And that was education based, not a fancy new dorm.
-I agree about fundraising not being the source of the revenue for this building but I can understand that person’s frustration. Unemployed and you get a letter in the mail from your college asking for money after reading this article. It’s bad PR.
I think “improve” is the key word here. They could have built a dorm building that wasn’t as outrageous as this and still would have been nice enough to attract students.
“Having nice facilities does attract new students but let me ask this: how many times have we talked about Emerson and their film program? That’s what drove up the cost of the tuition for every student yet only the film students used that high quality equipment. Didn’t that make you guys a bit upset?”
Honestly, no. I could’ve gone to a good state school and gotten an English degree for really cheap, but I decided to go to an expensive private school…
“Providing housing to anyone who wants it by creating a super luxury dorm that only a select few can live in, pushing everyone else to the older dorms.”
But if they hadn’t built it, everyone else would still be living in older dorms, and the kids living in this dorm would’ve moved off campus, creating more friction w/ neighbors. I kind of get it. But I don’t think it needed to be as opulent as it is. I think it’s laudable to try to get as many kids housed on campus as possible. Emerson is doing the same thing.
Agree to disagree. Sorry gals. 🙂
Oh, I was definitely like “Stupid spoiled brats!” but it didn’t bother me too much.
You guys should see the new Emerson dorm (the Colonial building). It’s AMAZING!
Whoohoo! I heard it had opened.