The reality of random roommates

Random roommates. A terrifying concept in theory and occasionally terrifying in execution.

However, at Augustana, most freshmen choose the random roommate process because they either don’t know anyone yet or are wanting to meet new people. Students who choose this fill out a survey of habits and likes/dislikes that will supposedly be able to place them with someone similar or compatible. The questions are generic — are you a night owl or early riser? Do you do your homework in the morning or at night? Do you prefer noise or a quiet room? 

They’re all questions that seem like they would be helpful in finding you an ideal roommate. However, the random roommate algorithm — which I know nothing about — doesn’t always produce the perfect pair. And when things don’t work out, VAs are often the ones on the front lines of the conflict.

At the beginning of the school year, each roommate pair receives a roommate agreement (yes, like on The Big Bang Theory). The students are supposed to sit down and go through the agreement together, writing down their answers. The agreement includes many of the things asked in the survey — when they’ll go to bed, when they’ll do homework, how often they’ll allow guests, how they’ll deal with possible conflicts. 

Now, I have no idea how many roommates actually fill this out together and how many simply take turns scribbling in their answers. I also have no idea how many students tell the truth about what kind of roommates they promise to be. I’m only required to hand them out, collect them, track students down if they don’t turn them in and pull the roommate agreement back out if there’s ever a conflict. 

I do know that roommate agreements are rarely, if ever, taken seriously, especially by freshmen. I also know that I’ve only used a roommate agreement once during a conflict mediation, and it ended in a move-out anyway. 

Besides the fact that I think that roommate agreements are wildly unhelpful, I think that the random roommate process is based purely on luck. Because, from my observations, there are four types of random roommate pairings, all of which I’ve seen firsthand.

Perfect best friends all the way through

I’ll start with the best possible outcome for a random roommate pairing — two strangers becoming lifelong friends. 

I will use myself as an example because I am so lucky to be in this category. 

For the first few days, my random roommate and I were unsure of each other. We couldn’t quite read the other person. Fast forward to present day and Janet is my best friend in the world. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t thank the Random Roommate Gods for placing me with the wonderful, crazy person that is my J. 

Part of our success came from our understanding of how the other functioned. We figured out each other’s schedule and were always respectful of the other’s space.

Even though Janet always stayed up late into the night — we’re talking 3 or 4 a.m. — and tended to take midday naps lasting an average of five hours, we made it work. She was always careful to come in quietly when I was sleeping and never turned the lights on even though I told her she could. If I came in during one of her naps, I always sat quietly at my desk doing homework with just my desk lamp on. 

For Janet and I, the pairing worked because we had fun. We did weird, crazy things together that felt completely normal to us, like hitting tennis balls at other people’s doors or making up our own version of “This Land is Your Land.” 

We knew each other’s limits and when we needed space. We often ended up in these three-hour conversations about life that left me both inspired and thankful. 

For all intents and purposes, we should have fallen under the nightmare category: we had almost opposite schedules, we have almost zero common interests and we’ve lived very different lives. But, it just worked. We understood each other, and we clicked. 

I’ve never met someone as wonderfully understanding as Janet, not to mention hilarious, crazy, protective and curious. We spent too many nights staying up talking when we should have been sleeping, and I knew I was guaranteed a tear-inducing laugh after she started with “this one time…” because Janet has the most unique stories. 

Although this category has turned more into a dedication to Janet than it has a description of what perfect random roommates are, I think it’s both. Because I love getting to tell people that my random freshman roommate is not only the best friend I’ve ever had but also my sister. 

Simply coexisting

If I had to guess, I would say that most freshmen fall into this category, especially men. You can usually tell right away if you’re going to click with your roommate. Students who see that their roommate is chill (as the kids say), nice and not a psycho but also not a lifelong friend, fall into this category.

A lot of roommates simply exist in the same space. You wouldn’t call them ‘friends,’ but they live together without issue in, what feels like, six feet of space. 

However, for VAs, this is the ideal kind of roommate pairing because you know you won’t have issues with them later on in the year. You’ll never have to intervene in their personal drama because they’re not really friends, and you’ll never have to intervene in roommate conflicts because they’re cordial and respectful of each other. 

This type of pairing also happens when either one or both students aren’t really looking for new friends. They already have an established friend group on campus, and they’re just happy that they won’t wake up to their roommate watching them sleep. 

Start out inseparable, then college happens 

This trajectory is super easy to follow because I’ve seen it happen many times, especially on women’s floors. The roommates will start texting during the summer before they move in. They’ll plan out who’s going to get what for the room and make plans to meet in person before move-in day. 

Then school starts, and they’re inseparable. They go to every meal together, go to every freshman event together and even take showers in side-by-side stalls so they can chat (don’t laugh, I’ve seen it happen). 

As a VA, this always makes me happy. I absolutely love watching my residents make friends and thrive their first few weeks of college. It makes my job easy and allows me to worry less.

Then October and November hit, and you don’t see them together as often. It’s understandable, though, because college starts to kick your butt at the end of September so both usually have a lot on their plates. 

Then it’s December, and you realize that you only ever see them hanging out with different people. From here, it’s like a choose-your-own-adventure novel because there are two ways it usually pans out.

First adventure: Their immediate obsession with each other wears off, and they start to find different friend groups, either within their major or their first-year seminar class. However, they still get along as roommates and are able to live together peacefully and without issue.

Second adventure: Things go south. A lot of times, I see this happen with roommates who come in as high school friends. They think that it’ll be easier or more fun to room with someone they already know. However, living with someone in a shoebox-sized room is a totally different ballgame than simply being friends for six hours a day in high school. 

Usually, with this path, this initial friendship turns to strong feelings of dislike, which then leads to a mediation with their VA.

Context: We encourage residents, if they’re having a roommate issue, to first try to solve it on their own. If that doesn’t work, they should get their VA involved. This usually includes VAs sitting down with the pair and attempting to hear both sides of the story and coming to some sort of a resolution. This resolution always lasts a few days, maybe a week at the most, and then they’re contacting their VA again with the same complaints. The next step is to get the hall director involved. Generally, if the hall director is involved, someone is moving out. 

Mediations are often a fruitless attempt at rectifying a situation that’s already beyond repair. And, in many cases, someone ends up moving out. 

Total nightmare

Unfortunately, these are usually something out of a horror movie. Some examples I’ve seen over the years: a roommate walking into their room now turned hair salon, blatant racism, forcing their roommate to be their therapist, having their roommate watch them watch Netflix, one roommate getting consistently trashed and throwing up in the room, one roommate attempting to steal the other’s medication and one who only left passive aggressive notes instead of actually communicating.

Now, clearly, these are all on very different levels. However, none of them lend themselves to a pleasant, freshman experience. 

Sharing a room is hard but especially if you’ve never done so before. For many residents, this is the case. However, it usually happens to be just one person who’s the issue, and that person usually gets moved out. 

I could go on about the various tales of random roommate horror stories, and I’m sure you’ve heard your fair share. However, the horror category is difficult to nail down because it differs so much in every ill-matched pairing. 

Luckily, I have an area director who is understanding of student needs and realizes that not being comfortable in your own room is not only unfair but is bad for your mental health. 

And, again, many of these cases end in a roommate separation. 

Where the VAs come in

We orchestrate mediations. I have two differing opinions on this. The first is that we are rarely a third party. We know these residents, we’ve lived on the same floor and we tend to have a bias toward one of them. It’s hard for us to mediate when, a lot of times, we don’t feel like we can be objective. However, we always do our best to transform ourselves into an objective third party with no personal interest in the conflict.

My other opinion is that, of course, we should be the ones dealing with these issues because we see things that the professional staff does not. Again, we also live with these residents. I have been in situations where I felt as though one resident needed to be moved but the powers that be wouldn’t authorize it, and I got frustrated because they don’t see the up-close issues. I’ve also been in a situation where I felt as though one resident was completely blameless but they’re the ones who, since they lodged a complaint, had to be the ones to move out. In this case, I felt helpless. 

No matter where I stand on an issue, though, I do my best to ensure a positive outcome for both residents. Because having a roommate isn’t always like the first category. Oftentimes, it’s messy, complicated, frustrating and weird. But for now, the random roommate process is what we’re stuck with, so we must do as all roommates should do: adapt or die (OK, not die, but just move out).