Home Away From Home

Living in an Elmira College dormitory is a wonderful way to start your college life!

All first year students live in double rooms, with a roommate. You tell us how you live and study, then we match you with a roommate with similar interests. Each double room has two desks, two dressers, two closets, two desk chairs, a set of fire retardant curtains and two standard single sized beds. Extra-long beds and mattresses are available for those requiring these accommodations.

Each room has an Internet connection for each student, independent of the telephone line. There is a phone connection in each room providing on-campus service at no cost. Local and long distance service is available. Each room has carpeting and free cable with more than 50 channels.

In each dorm, you can do your laundry (without quarters), cook a dinner in the pantry, and play piano or a game of pool. You can catch a game or your favorite show with your friends in the TV lounge and even grab a snack from the vending machines.

Each dorm is supervised by a professional staff member, the Residence Life Coordinator or RLC, and student staff, Resident Assistant or RA. The RLC lives in the building and a RA lives on each floor. These staff members are given extensive training to help meet the diverse needs of students.

You will have choices about where they would like to live. We try to place you in your first-choice building as a first year student, though it is not always possible. Our first year students are generally placed in Alumni, Anderson or Columbia Halls. Alumni and Anderson are co-ed buildings, while Columbia offers all female housing. It has proven to be a supportive environment for our first year students to live together, while they are adjusting to college life and going through many of the same struggles and triumphs. Not only do you live together you even get to take classes with those with whom you live.

Upperclassmen have additional living options. After the first year you may want to live in a suite style room with friends, or in a single room. There are Cottages (one or two bedroom apartments) and college owned houses in which you can apply to live. These are coveted living arrangements, competition is high and most students who earn these spots are fourth-year students. In addition, you may choose to live in a substance-free environment where smoking and alcohol are not permitted.

Living on campus gives you many options. That is why we require all undergraduate students to live on campus unless they live with a legal guardian within 50 miles, are 25 years of age or older, married or living with biological children. With all the campus has to offer, most people would not live anyplace else.