MAY 8, 2025 | OPINION | By Lily Ljiljanich and Rachel Weissman (Opinion Editor)
Disclaimer: This article is all in good humor, and aspects are satirical. And housing… please don’t put us in Loomis.
Here’s our take on the great Colorado College housing scandal (this year’s at least) and a few tips to game the system.
Many moons ago, this treacherous tale began in Bemis Great Hall. Home to a select few unlucky sophomores and juniors, as well as public enemy number one: the Housing Department. Deep in the shadows of the first floor lies dingy grey carpeting and a scatter of windowless offices. The array of colorful snacks and candy fails to mask the sour stench of passive aggression and condescending conversation. We’ve spent a cumulative 14 hours getting to know the staff.
To provide some context, we were roommates our first year in a Loomis double after Rachel slid into Lily’s Instagram DMs. Reborn amongst the chipping paint and sleepless nights, we bonded and inevitably stuck together for an upgrade in South Hall with our very own women’s bathroom, hallelujah! Next year, as juniors, we will take on a prized apartment (spoiler) and will reside together as seniors on N. Weber St. (hit us up for addy). A dynamic duo til the end.
On Feb. 17, the chaos began. We received identical, dreadfully late time slots, leaving us speechless. Like Kelce and Mahomes, we were heading for the three-peat; our time slot was likely to land us an unprecedented third consecutive year in a dormitory. We’d likely be making history as the first duo to live in all of the Big Three.
Here at the foot of the Front Range, every student receives a day and a timeslot, where they go into the no good, terrible, awful StarRez Housing Portal, and select housing for themselves and members of their roommate groups.
In our first year, Rachel was the one to select housing. Lily, trapped at Baca Campus, was reliant on a questionable internet connection to communicate during selection. Desperate, she tried to hijack the CC Geology Department van. Lily has since lost her license.
Students often manipulate roommate groups based on who has the best time slot to capitalize on the dumbass system. First to go are the highly sought-after East Campus apartments, where we’ve spent some of our most fun nights, closely followed by their counterparts on West Campus, then go the small houses and dorms.
Our biggest qualm was that the rising sophomores had better time slots. We witnessed friendship breakups and violent outbursts on Tava Quad. It was an all-out class war.
To clarify, that means rising sophomores would reside in the apartments, and our class would suffer a third year in the Big Three.
On Feb. 18, the day after receiving our time slots, the sun was shining on The Preserve Hill, but just a few yards away, a dark storm was brewing in Bemis. Upon arriving at the Housing Department, we were stopped short at the door by a line of infuriated rising juniors, seeking solutions and slipping cash.
Conspiring with our disgruntled peers, the junior class knew we had to band together. The Housing Office was cracking down on providing housing exemptions for third-year students, which had previously been simple to obtain, despite the three-year on-campus living requirement. However, lacking in beds, CC decided this year to enforce the restriction, leaving students to scramble. We heard rumors of transferring and homelessness. As married students qualified for housing exemptions, Shop Dog received an unprecedented influx of wedding reception inquiries.
After patiently waiting our turn and observing the tearful cries of students leaving more upset than when they arrived, we pleasantly stepped into Kaitlyn Griffin’s office, Assistant Director of Housing Operations.
We approached this conversation with grace. Rather than seeking an apartment, we simply sought answers: Why were rising sophomores ahead of their tenured peers? But Griffin’s demeanor shifted during our conversation from kind and accommodating to skeptical and weary.
She ushered us out of her office without resolve, on the promise of later following up, to address the flood of angry students drowning the sweet secretary while she offered candy and nice words. A drop of innocence in the swamp.
After our first meeting with Griffin, we went into Nathalie Rowell’s office, the Housing Program Coordinator, to raise the same questions and were met with uncertainty on her part. As a newer staff member, she humbly admitted the bounds of her agency.
Rowell was a muggle in a wizard’s world.
Leaving Bemis without answers, we returned to the Housing Office the next day. Deja vu.
Hours later, we received the infamous email, later reported on by The Catalyst in a breaking news article. As just the fourth recipient, we were privy to the Housing Department’s under-the-table deal with four rising juniors, seeking the same resolution as most of our class.
Upon receiving this, we were dumbfounded by the lack of consistency across the Housing Department and the random rewarding of housing.
On our third day in Bemis, Feb. 20, our new friends, including the almighty Director of Housing & Residential Experience, Samantha Soren, were expecting us amongst the growing crowd of students. However, this morning was strikingly different than the previous two days. Rather than an onslaught of employees prepared to answer questions and meet with students, a tumbleweed blew across the empty lounge. The few staff lingering were programmed to recite the following: “Griffin and Soren are not available until noon.”
The atmosphere changed. There was a clear first line of defense in the office that no student could breach. It was as if Rowell and her coworkers were private security for the operational offices of the only people with the mysterious StarRez access codes.
Gone were the days of pleasantries. They cut the shit. A few determined students waited it out in their lounge chairs as if in symbolic acts of defiance. “Revolutionaries,” we said in unison.
Something big was on the horizon. We will skip over the unflattering details of full sprint chasing down the higher-ups of the Housing Department. It was only a matter of time before they had to go to the bathroom.
The clock struck 12. Our phones buzzed simultaneously. An email from Outlook.
“New timeslots will be assigned based on class standing (priority)…”
At least here at CC, we still live in a democracy.
Our new time slot was not fabulous, but at least it was amongst only a pool of rising juniors, which is all we wanted.
After our bitchin’, this duo will live to see another day, but this time, in Edith Gaylord (hit us up for addy). Perhaps the unmistakable breeze of Loomis will waft over and remind us of where we came from. This time around, Lily was the one responsible for handling StarRez. Trapped in traffic, Rachel panicked. She has also since lost her license.
Despite our jabs, we write this article neither to complain nor demand premier housing, but rather to provide some transparency for our fellow students who felt unheard amid Emailgate. A crisis like this reveals friend and foe. God knows we’re far too familiar with the latter. We don’t take credit for it all, however, this intense 72-hour stint proved you really can complain about anything. In six months, we are getting our licenses back and perhaps one day our dedication will affect something that actually matters. But one thing we’ve learned from this is that all you need is a first-year roommate who’s as much of a hater as you.