THE DAILY TOREADOR
HOUSING GUIDE By: Carlos Gonzalez
THE DT TAKES OVER
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CAMPUS
Guide for successful roommate relationships By AYNSLEY LARSEN Staff Writer
Living with roommates comes with many different obstacles; from cleaning habits to sleep schedules, no two people are exactly the same. Choosing a living partner is a decision that will impact every aspect of a person’s life, and therefore must be made carefully. Emilee Hammond, a therapist at the Texas Tech Health Sciences Center, said two main components of a successful, healthy roommate relationship are communication and compromise. Hammond, who works with life transitions, anger management and boundaries, of-
ten sees roommate conflicts in her office. When asked about the benefits of living with a friend versus a stranger, Hammond favored the in betweens. “The best roommate situations that I see are right in between. They’re the friend of a friend, so they know someone who can vouch for them,” Hammond said. “I very rarely see friendships go well after roommates ... and strangers are like, ‘You know what? I don’t care; You’re not my friend.’” Hammond said insufficient communication can hurt friendships when individuals choose to become roommates. “Lots of friendships are ruined by living together,” Hammond said.
Friends tend to be too nice and avoid conflict, Hammond said. Instead of addressing an issue as it happens, both parties ignore the situation and move on, resulting in built up tension and longer lasting issues. “People are just trying to maintain, when really boundaries and expectations would save a lot of roommates and friendships,” Hammond said. Boundaries are important in roommate relationships. Establishing expectations is one of the many ways to promote healthy cohabitation and can be accomplished by different methods. Hammond recommended open, honest communication between roommates to promote con-
versation. “The biggest thing I suggest is having a dinner, or even a very formal meeting (to say) ‘These are my expectations, this is what I want in a living partner,’” Hammond said. Hammond also emphasized non-negotiables regarding compromise. Each roommate will have certain things that they are unwilling to settle on and defining those from the start will allow everyone to manage expectations, set boundaries and promote conversation and understanding. “Living together is just a big compromise over and over again,” Hammond said. “How can we make a situation where both of those non-negotiables
HOPE ESPOSITO/The Daily Toreador
Tech roommates take a break from studying to play board games in the Stangle dorm basement Feb. 24, 2023
are happy?” A negative living environment can have detrimental effects on your everyday life. Hammond described dropping grades, destroyed friendships and the depletion of overall mental health as results of a poor living situation. “From the moment you identify that this is not a safe place, you start to live in fight or flight mode. And when you’re in fight or flight mode, there’s not much you can do; there’s no learning that can be done, there’s no progress that can be made,” Hammond said. “And getting yourself out of fight or flight mode, especially in your living situation, is extremely difficult because that’s the place that you need to feel the most safe.” Furthermore, Hammond suggested looking for an impartial mediator to help resolve conflict and address these negative environments. Look for a friend that will not pick a side, a mutual professor or even a representative at the counseling center. Roman Konopah, a fourthyear psychology major of San Antonio, mentioned similar advice on behalf of TTU Risk Intervention and Safety Education (RISE). Konopah, RISE Sexual Assault/Consent & Sexual Health Committee Chair, highlighted some of the resources the organization offers, including an impartial third-party option for students.
“At RISE we are trained in talking with you about healthy and unhealthy relationships. That’s not just for romantic relationships, that can be for roommates, friendships, family. If you ever need someone to talk to or someone that has those resources, please come to the RISE office,” Konopah said. “We do have people that specialize in talking about those subjects, so feel free to come to the RISE office and talk to us.” Ko n o p a h , a l o n g w i t h Hammond, emphasized discussions between potential roommates and determining if you work and function well with another person before choosing to live with them. “If possible, communicate with your roommate before you can move in with them, and don’t settle. If that person’s gonna be living with you for at least a year, you need to really think about that and really understand, ‘Is this ok for me?’” Konopah said. Living with another person is complicated and requires constant effort and communication. In order to promote healthy and fair relationships amongst roommates, everyone involved has to be open to change, to compromise and to the altering of set habits and ideas. “To be able to grow, and to live and to function in a better society, you have to take on different thought values, different ideas,” Hammond said. @AynsleyLarsenDT
Approval for new residence hall By MARIANNA SOURIALL Staff Writer
Approval of the design concept and starting budget for the $640,397 West Village II, a new residential hall, has been granted as of Feb. 23 during the Board of Regents meeting. The new housing unit will resemble the exterior of the existing West Village and the interior will be modeled after the suite style apartments in Talkington. The 300-bed housing unit is intended for returning undergraduate and graduate students. “Last year, we only allowed 800 returners to come back to campus knowing that our freshman class was too big to
hold very much more,” senior managing director for university student housing Tanya Massey said. “That was partly because Bledsoe was under renovation, but what we realized is there’s a desire for more upperclassmen spaces, more suite style spaces. The goal of this project is to increase suite style housing availability that’s needed for upperclassmen. The new build will be designed very similar to Talkington but will be upperclassmen only.” West Village II is expected to open in Fall of ‘25, Massey said. “We use West Village as part of our 12-month housing program, so we have a lot of students that
live out there year-round,” Massey said. “This is going to be added to that section of housing out there, so there’s a high likelihood that it will be open yearround.” Regarding pricing, Massey said the amenities will influence the final price, but those are semantics that have not been decided yet. Moreover, Vice Chancellor for Facilities Planning and Construction Billy Breedlove said during the Board of Regents meeting, the expected project budget is 38 million; the anticipated amount includes a 6-10 percent inflation rate on products. The initial budget approved at the meet-
ing will come from the university student housing funds. Chief Financial Officer Noel Sloan said during the Board of Regents meeting, the new residential hall will permit renovations as part of a long-term strategy to provide sufficient housing facilities. “An additional 300 beds also provides us the ability to take down wings of the other older residence halls so we can get in and do some renovations there,” Sloan said. “That is also going to give us enough beds to be able to flex between the upperclassmen returning students and where we need to do some renovation work.” The site is additionally
CARLOS GONZALEZ/The Daily Toreador The Board of Regents approved the construction of a new resident hall the land beside the West Village Resident Hall
being evaluated for parking, but no decision has been made thus far. Massey said the residence halls provide scaffolded levels of independence while maintaining a support system through the staff. “We’re always at 100 percent occupancy in the fall and there is a waiting list of students who
want to get into dorms,” President of TTU Lawrence Schovanec said “We’ve noticed that upperclassmen seem to have a growing interest in being on campus. We have looked at issues like grade point average, graduation rate giving and living on campus has a positive effect in all of those different areas” @MariannaS_DT