Transfer students eligible for special housing option

By Rick Techman

A student housing floor for transfer students will be available at NIU next semester.

John “Jack” Felver, assistant director of Student Housing, said any transfer student, as recognized by office of admissions, who has earned at least 12 credit hours at another school will be eligible to apply for the floor.

Student Housing Director Donald Buckner and other staff members started accepting applications to the floor in October, Felver said, adding the total number of transfer floors is undecided now.

The location of the floor is still undecided, but student housing officials decided a floor or floors of less popular themes will be dissolved to make way for a transfer floor, he said.

Students eligible to apply for the transfer student floor must be entering NIU for their first semester, Felver said.

Students transfering from any accredited junior college or four-year university must meet all admissions requirements, he said.

The floor will be operated as a theme floor overseen by a resident assistant who is also a transfer student, but it will not have ties to academic classes, Felver said. All majors are accepted on the floor, he said.

Programs and activities offered might vary in response to the individual needs of each floor, Felver said. Housing staff members will help transfer students adapt to the NIU curriculum, he said.

Already, applications received by the housing office show interest in the floor, Felver said.

Deneen Strain, an NIU transfer student from South Suburban Community College, said she had a problem coordinating transfer credit hours with required NIU classes.

Strain and several other transfer students said they feel the transfer floor needs a permanent counselor to help transfer students coordinate their junior college courses with NIU requirements.

Mary Brown, a transfer student from Harper College, in Palatine, said that entering NIU for the spring semester is especially tough.

Brown said she felt it is hard to fit in while everyone else appears to know each other and the school so well. She said all transfer students are in a similar situation and that it would be easier to work together sharing the same floor.