Just like this

In case you haven’t heard (read: you haven’t heard, but) registration opens tomorrow for the 2013 housing process.  In preparation for this, we boiled down the housing process as concisely as we could to help you understand WTF anything is.  Please feel free to ask further questions in the comments–and upperclassmen, please share wisdom–or email us at housing@bwog.com.

Of note: The traditional “Suite Selection” has been retitled “In-Person Group Selection” while “General Selection” is now “Online Selection.” Literal naming–wordy but effective!

1. Registration (March 6th-14th) Everyone registers on the housing portal. You can either do In-Person Group Selection with 1 to 7 other people (so groups of 2-8) or go straight to Online Selection. If you opt for In-Person Group Selection, you get to participate in Online Selection with the same lottery number if you decide not to make a room choice during In-Person Group Selection or if there is no suite available for your group size. Each group must have a person picked as the “coordinator” to act as a point person.  Feel free to make up an inappropriate name.
2. Numbers (Mar. 25th–though history has shown to check earlier): Lottery and priority numbers are assigned. Each group (In-Person) or person (Online) is assigned a priority number and a lottery number. Priority: 10 = rising sophomore, 20 = rising junior, 30 = rising senior (based on the semester you started at Columbia, not on your current standing). For a group, the group priority is the average of all the group members’ priorities (i.e. a group of 2 sophomores and 2 juniors would have a priority number of 15). Lottery numbers are assigned to each group in In-Person Group Selection and each individual in Online Selection at random from 1-3000. They are independent of priority numbers.
3. Appointment Times (Mar. 28th): Your In-Person Group Selection appointments times are then assigned first by priority number then by lottery number. So, ignoring mixed class groups, all seniors pick before all juniors, who pick before all sophomores. After you get your appointment times, you’re locked in and have to wait until the actual In-Person Group Selection process. Read Bwog every day during In-Person Group Selection for our minute-to-minute (read: panicked) updates about the remaining suites available.
4. Regrouping (Apr. 3-11): At the end of their respective class-based priority appointment times (end of all 30-point groups, and then end of all 20-point groups), seniors and juniors may regroup with other class members to form new configurations with new randomly-assigned lottery numbers valid only for the regroup process. If a group still fails to select a suite, they then fall to Online Selection with their original priority and lottery number. At the end of the 10-point priority appointment times, 10-point groups may split into group of two to pick into corridor doubles. Otherwise, they also drop to Online Selection.
5. Online Selection (Apr. 17-30): After the hullabaloo of In-Person Group Selection, Online Selection appointment times are posted. Online Selection is done–you guessed it–online, not in person. How appropriate.
6. The Dregs (May 1st): After selection is over, some sophomores will be left without a room. If  you did not get assigned a room, you go on a waitlist and get whatever is left over after Housing makes final assignments. If you do not like your room selection, you may apply for summer transfer. The people who apply for summer transfer get to pick again in reverse-Lottery number order.

Get ready, get set…..HOUSE.

Housing you should totally expect from Columbia via Shutterstock