Living on campus your first two years is truly a blast. You have access to everything you need on campus. People, events close by, a meal plan, a bed five minutes from your classroom so you can wake up 10 minutes before class  with just enough time to brush your teeth and put on sweats. Life is good when you’re living on campus.

According to the university policy on residence halls, it is mandatory that you live on campus through junior year, with a few exceptions.

As a senior you can petition to get off campus. I enjoy living on campus more than trying to get a house or apartment off campus.

I am blessed to be surrounded by great friends who have been or have become my roommates over the past  four years I’ve been here. I have had fun rolling out of bed Saturday to hear the cheers and screams from Mt. Clef and William Rolland Stadiums.

I have enjoyed the havoc and pranks my friends and I have played with other friends. Being on campus is like living in Neverland, and I am Peter Pan.

But  there are students who don’t enjoy living on campus as much as I do. They can’t deal with the ‘‘authority’’ of the resident assistants. They are too loud and get in trouble for it.

Some of them want to drink in the dorms but get caught. They just want to be their own authority. They want to have their own good time and have even more privacy. But wanting this privacy comes at a big risk.

Say you want to throw some sort of party at your off-campus house. Your roommates are down, you go out and buy some booze, charge $5 at the door and invite maybe 50 of your friends.

Now, 50 of your friends are telling their friends, who are telling friends. Pretty soon you have 150 drunk 18 to 20 year olds in your home.

The police will likely be called and you will be slapped with an expensive ticket for providing alcohol to underage drinkers.

You have this ticket, pay it off in time, lose the safety deposit for your place and you may be looking at a possible eviction from the landlord.

By no means am I trying to scare you out of moving off campus, but I would like to urge you to reconsider.

Nate Fall, assistant director of Residence Life is not looking to deny your petition to live off campus, but is merely looking out for your own good.

“The issue of moving off campus is they really don’t understand the world they go into,” said Fall. “We have, what I think are nice halls for a number of reasons. We get it: As upperclassmen, you want to live in an apartment-style complex and that’s why we have them.”

There are exceptions to the stereotypical, off-campus student.Junior Lee Trotter was merely fed up with the bad luck he had with roommates and on-campus living quarters.

“I needed my space from being in a dorm with four other people. The college charm of living with others kind of wore off,” said Trotter. “I felt like I would work better in an off-campus environment.”

Trotter was going into his junior year knowing that he was on the waiting list for Trinity hall.

He was stuck with a terrible selection number, and was placed in the same exact room as the previous year. Trotter finally got fed up with it.

“We feel responsible enough now, we are juniors,” said Trotter.

Don’t be in a rush to grow up. By no means am I saying walk around in diapers or pull a “Van Wilder” but just enjoy the moments you have.

Enjoy the easy access to food. Enjoy the people and the opportunities you have with one another on campus. Enjoy being surrounded by more than 1,000 of your peers.

Just enjoy your life here because when you’re out of college with adult worries, you’re going to wish you never left Neverland.

Rafael Padilla
Staff Writer
Published Nov. 7, 2012