Would you share a dorm room with a person of the opposite sex? College students at 20 campuses across the country said they would, according to the National Student Genderblind Campaign.
Schools like University of Pennsylvania, Brown University and Oberlin University have implemented gender-blind, or coed, dorm rooms at the request of their student bodies, according to genderblind.org.
Campuses originally started to turn toward gender-blind dorm rooms in order to better accommodate gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students who said they would feel more comfortable living with the opposite sex, according to the Web site.
Students who did not fall into those categories soon requested gender-blind rooms as well. Some students who have chosen this option have done so in order to live with a good friend, a boyfriend, girlfriend or a sibling. Others have done so just to try something new.
Originally, gender-blind housing was an East Coast trend, but recently, more West Coast schools have started to consider it. UC Berkeley has a whole wing just for coed living and the University of Arizona has started to address the issue and is working on a pilot program for next fall, according to an article from the Arizona Daily Wildcat.
So is this something that could happen at our campus? Not anytime soon, according to Stan Olin, director of Housing & Residential Life.
The existing dorm facilities could not accommodate gender-blind rooms because of the bathroom setup, according to Olin. Males and females would have to share the same bathroom facilities with the current setup and that is not something that the housing department says is feasible.
In addition to the bathroom issue, gender-blind rooms go against traditional values. Olin feels that if Cal State Long Beach were to give the choice of coed dorm rooms, he would have many calls from parents.
Despite the housing department’s view, some students feel more open to the idea.
“I wouldn’t mind it at all. I think it would be good to have a girl as a roommate,” said Riley DePiano, an undeclared freshman and a dorm resident.
Other students said that they would feel more comfortable if they knew the other person.
“I would only room with a guy if I had known him for awhile –like a good friend or something,” said freshman kinesiology major Madeline Roel.
However, other students, like sophomore international business major Kaitlyn Malkiewiez, said they would feel uncomfortable having the opposite sex for a dorm roommate.
At the 20 campuses that offer gender-blind housing, it is an option for the students, so those who wish to have a same sex roommate can still do so.
While the housing department at CSULB is not currently considering the coed dorm room option, it has been brought up. Olin said he was informally asked if a brother and sister could room together, but no formal requests have ever been made to allow coed rooms.
As for now, Olin does not see gender-blind housing as an option for our campus and you will not be seeing any “same sex” boxes on your housing applications in the near future.
