Coed dorm rooms at college?

In the prim 1950s, college dorms were
off-limits to members of the opposite sex. Then came the 1970s, when
male and female students started crossing paths in coed dormitories.
Now, to the astonishment of some Baby Boomer parents, a growing number
of colleges are going even further: Coed rooms.

At
least two dozen schools, including Brown University, the University of
Pennsylvania, Oberlin College, Clark University and the California
Institute of Technology, allow some or all students to share a room
with anyone they choose — including someone of the opposite sex. This
spring, as students sign up for next year’s room, more schools are
following suit, including Stanford University.

As shocking as it sounds to some parents, some students and schools say it’s not about sex.

Instead,
they say the demand is mostly from heterosexual students who want to
live with close friends who happen to be of the opposite sex. Some gay
students who feel more comfortable rooming with someone of the opposite
sex are also taking advantage of the option.
“It
ultimately comes down to finding someone that you feel is compatible
with you,” said Jeffrey Chang, a junior at Clark in Worcester, Mass.,
who co-founded the National Student Genderblind Campaign, a group that
is pushing for gender-neutral housing. “Students aren’t doing this to
make a point. They’re not doing this to upset their parents. It’s
really for practical reasons.”
Cases of 'roomcest'
Couples
do sometimes room together, an arrangement known at some schools as
“roomcest.” Brown explicitly discourages couples from living together
on campus, be they gay or straight. But the University of California,
Riverside has never had a problem with a roommate couple breaking up
midyear, said James C. Smith, assistant director for residence life.
Most
schools introduced the couples option in the past three or four years.
So far, relatively few students are taking part. At the University of
Pennsylvania, which began offering coed rooms in 2005, about 120 out of
10,400 students took advantage of the option this year.
At
UC Riverside, which has approximately 6,000 students in campus housing,
about 50 have roommates of the opposite sex. The school has had the
option since 2005.



Coed Rooms?