Housing's new market
Next year, for the first time in almost a decade, the Department of Student Housing at the University of Kansas won’t be renovating a residence hall. Department of Student Housing is encouraging returning students to live in the residence halls another year by mounting a marketing campaign.
The campaign, which began this fall and will continue through spring semester, has the tagline: “Don’t just attend KU – live KU!”
With the completion of the Hashinger Hall renovations this fall, the Department of Student Housing finished its current renovations project. It has renovated Templin, Lewis, Ellsworth and Hashinger Halls. The University finished renovating Templin Hall in 1998.
Templin Hall was the first residence hall to begin the new round of renovations.
Kip Grosshans, associate director of Student Housing, said that each time Department of Student housing has done renovations, it gave new students priority over returning students in order to guarantee new students on-campus housing. The Department of Student Housing finished renovating the residence halls, so now it wants to encourage returning students to come back to the halls for a second or third year.
“This is a way to remind folks who are already with us that they might want to consider staying with us for the next year,” Grosshans said.
The meaning of the tagline, according to Grosshans, is that student housing offers a diverse and rewarding living environment. One advertisement on the Department of Student Housing Web site reads, “I‘m definitely returning to Student Housing. I’ve made great friends, food’s good, and I got a cool job right where I live.”
One bonus of living in the residence halls, according to Grosshans, is the easy access to food at the dining centers. “Going to the grocery store, schlepping the food into the car, paying for the food, going back to the apartment, unloading the food, fixing the food, cleaning up after the food; it’s a huge amount of time. It doesn’t seem like much when you think about it in general, but it’s time that most students really don’t have.”
Eric Grospitch, interim executive assistant to the director, said, “Our return numbers are up over last year. Having a year offline with Hashinger, that was 375 beds. It’s just a matter of getting those returners to stay on and seeing us beyond a first-year option.”
According to Grosshans, 452 sophomores and 101 juniors live in the residence halls this year out of a total 3,397 students.
Lindsey Eagle, Kansas City, Mo. junior, appears on the posters. She said that she thinks the Department of Student Housing is heading in the right direction by encouraging returning students to come back. She said that at her job as a student office assistant for the Department of Student Housing, she has received substantially more phone calls from prospective returning students than what she remembers from the past two years. She said usually students didn’t call until just a day or two before the “Intent to Return” form deadline.
“Students see the ads, which in turn causes them to contact our office to inquire about the process,” Eagle said.
Patrick Sittenauer, Kansas City, Mo. freshman, said that he will return to McCollum Residence Hall next year because he feels comfortable there. He said he has everything he needs: A bed, closet space, clean bathrooms and a desk. He said that if he lived anywhere else he would have to buy all of those things.
Sittenauer said he likes the residence halls because he’s met so many people. “You can pretty much always find someone to eat at E’s with,” Sittenauer said. “The dorms embody the spirit of a university: a place for any exchange of ideas, a place to learn. With 900 people within a few thousand square feet, I am sure you will find differing opinions.”
Sittenauer said he loves McCollum, but one of his gripes is all the rules. “It’s like living in my parents’ home. I can understand the reason for all the rules, and I would not change them, but living in a place one calls home means I should be able to set the rules.”
Ryan Bruno, Overland Park sophomore, said that the residence halls are a great place to meet new people. He said there’s always something going on there and that the residence halls feel like a home away from home.
“There is a bit of vulnerability that people feel when they come to the dorms, but it makes them more open to meet new people,” Bruno said. “It was a vulnerability that I welcomed when I came to KU.”
Bruno decided to return to the residence halls for a second year because he didn’t have enough money to live on his own. He said that he met new people and strengthened his relationships from last year as well.
Although Bruno said he dislikes the sometimes dirty bathrooms, the occasional fire alarms and late-night noise, he calls all of these complaints silly. “That’s part of the unique life of living in the dorms,” Bruno said.
Grosshans said this marketing program was a special project from the director of Student Housing. The campaign started by distributing bookmarks to the residence hall Academic Resource Centers in early October. The posters came out in the middle of October. Recently, Department of Student housing placed table tents in the dining centers. Department of Student Housing also bought advertisement space on a campus bus. Soon, Department of Student Housing will send out two sets of slightly different postcards: one set to students and one set to their parents.
For this campaign, Department of Student Housing is offering returning students the chance to sign their contract early. In years past, during the school year returning students could only fill out an “Intent to Return” form, which only noted their housing preferences and it didn’t guarantee them anything. Because residents can sign their contracts early this year, they can immediately choose their exact room and building assignment instead of waiting for weeks.
Both Grosshans and Grospitch are excited to see more returning students in the residence halls. “We know we’re going to get around 75 percent, perhaps even more, of the entering freshman class each year,” Grosshans said.
He said that returning students are a commodity in a residence hall. “It would be great if the resident assistant wasn’t the only upperclassmen on the floor and that there was someone else to ask, ‘how to we do this camping for tickets thing?’”
Grosshans said that the Department of Student Housing is confident it will get plenty of new student admissions because of its Web site and view book. “The big deal for us is to increase our population of the students we want most, and frankly, that’s the people who’ve lived with us before.”