# Co-ed Dorm Rooms...



## Relayer (Nov 9, 2005)

Good idea or no?

Would you allow your daughter or son to have such an arrangement?

I have 2 daughters in college (sophmore and freshman). The request would never be made, but if it was, my answer would be "NO".


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## brokencycle (Jan 11, 2008)

I think it would be awkward - maybe if the two were dating. I am in school, and I know people who think it is awkward or whatever to have rooms alternating gender.

I don't think it is terribly appropriate. If a guy and girl want to live together, they can get an apartment.


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## jackmccullough (May 10, 2006)

Allow? Anyone have kids in college?

Most college students are adults, and there is a limit to what parents can do to control their behavior. Even when I went to college a hundred years ago I'm pretty sure my parents never knew who any of my dorm roommates were.

I don't know if they knew, and I don't know if they would have cared, that I spent my entire sophomore living with my then girlfriend (now wife) and her roommate in the women's side of our dorm. Nobody minded, including all the women on our floor.

I don't think this is a big deal.


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## Kav (Jun 19, 2005)

I lasted 3 weeks in a coed dorm at UC Santa Cruz, 3rd floor at Merrill College among the redwoods to be exact. I had asked this girl in the dorm to a campus concert. I'm in the communal bathroom in the stall and recognised her footsteps. Door Creeeeeek, zip sound of denim sliding down and then this most dainty of plop- plop-plop followed by a musty bouguet no patchouli oil could mask. And then, " uh Chris? is that you?" And I answered, " um, yes." followed by " uh, Chris, I'm terribly afraid I am going to stand you up for the concert. In fact, I am going with somebody else. I have finally discovered my true love and path." A moment of irritation on my part followed by three more nervous 'plop -plops' next door. " well, O.K. if thats your decision thats your choice. Who's the lucky guy?" folowed by " um, well actually it's Stephanie the blonde girl from Washington State and..." I'm out of the head, both laughing my head off at the absurdity and embaressed to be part of such childish social posturing by the University. I was out of the coed floor that afternoon. The joke was later my dear friend Allison the punker was kicked out of 5 rooms by hippie roommates and asked if we could room. We did, and with great success. Our first summer back in SOCAL she intoduced me as 'Kav' We sleep together, but have seperate bathrooms.COED DORMS DO NOT WORK!


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## Howard (Dec 7, 2004)

Just as long as nothing goes on,I guess it would be ok.


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## Spence (Feb 28, 2006)

Not a big deal. Most dorms are pretty much a free for all to begin with unless you're old school.

-spence


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## LoftonsGC (Dec 11, 2007)

I'm not sure how I feel about this. Having just graduated college three years ago and working in higher ed ever since, I'm sure that it creates problems. The article stated the schools weren't having any problems with break ups, I don't see how that's possible. I guess if most the people are just "friends" and not dating that wouldn't be an issue. Couples wise- you have a lot of people who are co-habitating in college, but they generally have their own room to go back to should a problem arise. My school had apartments that were co-ed, but never rooms. I guess only time will tell if this will become the new trend in colleges everywhere, except the religiously affiliated schools that would have a heart attack.
-Lofton


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## eagle2250 (Mar 24, 2006)

Admitting that I am old fashioned and perhaps a tad chauvinistic, I have two daughters and, as they attended college on "Dad's" dime, they played by Dad's rules...given the issue at hand, NO coed dorms, though the younger daughter did live in an apartment with three other female roommates. Acknowledging the probable reality of Jack's observation, my daughters obeyed the rules...at least when Dad came to campus for a visit! :icon_wink:


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## 16128 (Feb 8, 2005)

People are people, and a fellow Russian major one can study with sounds like a great roommate. Just because someone is the same gender doesn't mean that you have anything else in common, like musical taste, nocturnal habits or neatness. 

But I think it's wise to make sure this stays completely voluntary, which sounds as if it's the case.


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## yachtie (May 11, 2006)

jackmccullough said:


> Allow? Anyone have kids in college?
> 
> Most college students are adults...










^^^That's so rich! Or maybe the "adults" you know are _really _immature.


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

I'm not sure I agree with the "adult" concept either. I don't think college kids are there yet.


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## jackmccullough (May 10, 2006)

You can find stupid people who act like stupid people at every age. Still, someone who is 18 years of age is an adult, with the rights and responsibilities of an adult. That's why, among other things, you aren't entitled to your kids' grades or their health center records at college, or who visits them in their room, unless they agree to the disclosure of that information.


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

jackmccullough said:


> *You can find stupid people who act like stupid people at every age.* Still, someone who is 18 years of age is an adult, with the rights and responsibilities of an adult. That's why, among other things, you aren't entitled to your kids' grades or their health center records at college, or who visits them in their room, unless they agree to the disclosure of that information.


Like me! :icon_smile_big:

But I still disagree. I think it is more of a de jure, de facto thing. They have been given the rights by law, but in reality college students are still just slightly older and slightly more mature teenagers.


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## Liberty Ship (Jan 26, 2006)

Honestly, I still haven't gotten used to the notion of coeducational _colleges_!

Girls, like alcohol, are for weekends!


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## Howard (Dec 7, 2004)

yachtie said:


> ^^^That's so rich! Or maybe the "adults" you know are _really _immature.


I hate those people who get milk to come out of their nose.


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## Mike Petrik (Jul 5, 2005)

jackmccullough said:


> You can find stupid people who act like stupid people at every age. Still, someone who is 18 years of age is an adult, with the rights and responsibilities of an adult. That's why, among other things, you aren't entitled to your kids' grades or their health center records at college, or who visits them in their room, unless they agree to the disclosure of that information.


True, and completely moronic. We have a culture where teens and twenty-somethings are given rights without responsibilities. The laws mentioned above evolved in the 1970s, and they represented the reckless abandonment of the traditional doctrine of locus parentis. I'm all for 18 year-olds being adults. They should leave home, get a job, get married, have children, and grow up. Unless they are prepared to do that, they are not adults.

I agree with Kav. This is a mischievious idea. But hey, why not -- after all, this is why God made birth control, abortions, and those famously effective blended families.


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## Lushington (Jul 12, 2006)

Mike Petrik said:


> I'm all for 18 year-olds being adults. They should leave home, get a job, get married, have children, and grow up. Unless they are prepared to do that, they are not adults.


Only those who are married, with children, are adults?


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## Mike Petrik (Jul 5, 2005)

Lushington said:


> Only those who are married, with children, are adults?


Gotta love guys who like to play polemics. Let me be clearer: leave home, get a job to support yourself, and have the maturity to know that with sex comes the responsibility of marriage and potentially children. Thirty or forty years ago western society decided to abandon a couple millennia of tradition born from experience and an understanding of human nature in favor of the theory that sex, marriage and children were all basically nothing more than social and consumer options, each separate and unrelated, and there has been social hell to pay ever since.


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## Lushington (Jul 12, 2006)

Mike Petrik said:


> Gotta love guys who like to play polemics. Let me be clearer: leave home, get a job to support yourself, and have the maturity to know that with sex comes the responsibility of marriage and potentially children. Thirty or forty years ago western society decided to abandon a couple millennia of tradition born from experience and an understanding of human nature in favor of the theory that sex, marriage and children were all basically nothing more than social and consumer options, each separate and unrelated, and there has been social hell to pay ever since.


Polemics? I asked a question in response to your rather odd, not to say polemical, statement regarding the relationship between marriage, child-rearing, and adulthood. You want polemics?


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## Mike Petrik (Jul 5, 2005)

Nothing odd about my statement, and it wasn't polemical if one properly appreciates the service of the word "prepared." Perhaps I mistook you for trying to score a debating point without engaging the merits; if so, I apologize.


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

Mike Petrik said:


> Gotta love guys who like to play polemics. Let me be clearer: leave home, get a job to support yourself, and have the maturity to know that with sex comes the responsibility of marriage and potentially children. Thirty or forty years ago western society decided to abandon a couple millennia of tradition born from experience and an understanding of human nature in favor of the theory that sex, marriage and children were all basically nothing more than social and consumer options, each separate and unrelated, and there has been social hell to pay ever since.


While I agree with much of what you say, I disagree that sex without "benefit" of marriage necessarily connotes less maturity in the individual.


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## tabasco (Jul 17, 2006)

jackmccullough said:


> You can find stupid people who act like stupid people at every age. Still, someone who is 18 years of age is an adult, with the rights and responsibilities of an adult. That's why, among other things, you aren't entitled to your kids' grades or their health center records at college, or who visits them in their room, unless they agree to the disclosure of that information.


Had to laugh. That sounds so... well, "*Laissez-faire*", an attitude not often associated with the political left (I hope that's OK, Jack).

However, I agree...it's their life.


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## yachtie (May 11, 2006)

Mike Petrik said:


> Gotta love guys who like to play polemics. Let me be clearer: leave home, get a job to support yourself, and have the maturity to know that with sex comes the responsibility of marriage and potentially children. Thirty or forty years ago western society decided to abandon a couple millennia of tradition born from experience and an understanding of human nature in favor of the theory that sex, marriage and children were all basically nothing more than social and consumer options, each separate and unrelated, and there has been social hell to pay ever since.


+1 What we have now is license masquerading as 'freedom'.



KenR said:


> While I agree with much of what you say, I disagree that sex without "benefit" of marriage necessarily connotes less maturity in the individual.


Sorry, sex entails responsibility. Attempts to separate the two have wreaked significant social and individual harm by promoting irresponsibility as a "lifestyle choice". Marriage is, among other things, the acceptance of the responsibility that comes along with having sex.


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## septa (Mar 4, 2006)

It really isn't that big of a deal.

I went to a college where this was an option and it was, as the article noted, taken advantage of by a few homosexual students seeking to _avoid_ sexual tension. Gay males and lesbian women often roomed together. Nineteen year olds are dumb, but most of them know that sharing a dorm room with someone they could be attracted to is stupid.

Also, at my college, rooms were singles and people usually ended up living with their SOs.


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

I disagree. Sex entails responsibility to oneself and ones partner, but I do not believe responsibility _must_ include marriage.


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## Relayer (Nov 9, 2005)

Yes, an 18 year old student is, by law, an adult... sort of... mostly.

However, for the majority of these adult 18 year old students (my guess), mom and dad still pay most or all of their bills. At the orientation at the University of Georgia, they strongly urge all parents to get the agreement of their child/student so that they can access and monitor the student's grades/progress. This is real world.

And, by law, this 18 year old adult student is not allowed to purchase or consume alcohol.

By law, this 18 year old adult student is not allowed to purchase a handgun or handgun ammunition.

So, for those who point to the legal definition of adult, yes, the "adult" label is there, as determine by our all-knowing government... and yet, these 18 year old adults still have a limited set of adult "privileges".

Why do you think that is? 

Do you think this is wrong (ie, 18 year old, as an adult should be able to purchase a handgun and ammo, just like a 25 year old adult)?

Kids at age 18, 19, etc still often need real adult guidance. It must be carefully applied to be effective, or course. But it is often very much required.


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## LeonS (Apr 23, 2008)

Relayer said:


> Yes, an 18 year old student is, by law, an adult... sort of... mostly.
> 
> However, for the majority of these adult 18 year old students (my guess), mom and dad still pay most or all of their bills. At the orientation at the University of Georgia, they strongly urge all parents to get the agreement of their child/student so that they can access and monitor the student's grades/progress. This is real world.
> 
> ...


But you still can legally participate in pornographic productions. Kind of stupid, isn't it?


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## Mike Petrik (Jul 5, 2005)

drin said:


> But you still can legally participate in pornographic productions. Kind of stupid, isn't it?


Yes indeed.


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## Acct2000 (Sep 24, 2005)

I await the day when those under 21 have to be certified as "hot" by a governmental agency before they can earn money that way.


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## 16128 (Feb 8, 2005)

drin said:


> But you still can legally participate in pornographic productions. Kind of stupid, isn't it?


And join the military, with control over weapons, ammo and $45m aircraft.

If you go overseas, you CAN drink at 18. Unless it's one of those unfortunate Islamic law countries.


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## TheWardrobeGirl (Mar 24, 2008)

My opinion: If you are old enough to die for our country and you are living independently, you should be old enough to drink alcohol, pick your roommate, etc...if you are old enough to die for our country but your parents still pay your bills and are paying for your college education, parents get to make the call.

As a female, I have tons of male friends and have always had tons of male friends. I have opened my house for any of my friends - male or female, and over the years I have had male roommates...that said I have not and would not open my bedroom...unless I am in a romantic relationship, I think it is inappropriate for men and women to share bedrooms as roommates.


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## Howard (Dec 7, 2004)

I don't see no harm if a boy and girl could share the same dorm room together,just got to keep it at a college level.


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## jpeirpont (Mar 16, 2004)

Most dorms seem to be co-ed anyway.


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## Howard (Dec 7, 2004)

jpeirpont said:


> Most dorms seem to be co-ed anyway.


and what if they decided to have sex,then what happens?


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## android (Dec 8, 2004)

Howard said:


> and what if they decided to have sex,then what happens?


Ask your Mom, she will tell you to ask your Dad. They they will ramble on about when you're old enough they'll tell you and never get to the point.


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## Cadillac-89 (May 6, 2008)

Relayer said:


> Would you allow your daughter or son to have such an arrangement?


I'd say at that age it wouldn't be your choice.


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