Update on Student Housing Options
Dear Students,
Apologies for the delay in getting information to you about the options for student housing in the upcoming academic year. We had inquiries from students, parents and staff during the town hall that we wanted to give some attention.
After consideration of the input provided, the option we are planning to move forward with for next year is to provide Kepler student housing by creating a dormitory at Gulf Hotel, located just down the street from Kepler's campus.
We'll be working on the processes for making this happen over the next few weeks including board budget approval, getting a contract with the owner of Gulf Hotel and arranging the logistics.
We are also looking into mitigating the risks and challenges raised during various meetings. We'll be meeting with staff and student groups including the SGA, RAs and committees to set rules and regulations for the housing and think through the processes for ensuring safety and security. We'll also be spraying the current houses for bed bugs before the move begins.
A few important notes:
- As we have discussed, there are a limited number of housing spots. If there are more requests than there are housing spots, we will be filtering through applications to see if there are students who requested housing and have:
- violated housing policies in the past year that resulted in probation or other
consequences
- students who have been found to disturb other students while using alcohol or
smoking
- security or safety violations in the community including those who have had
negative interactions with police, village leaders, local security, et
- those who violated housing expectations such as sleeping on the assigned
bed or in the assigned room given; past history of not giving contributions as
expected
- If we still have an excess request, after these considerations, we will review
students who are employed with a salary of over 150K RWF take home
Tomorrow, May 9, you will receive a survey regarding your decision to opt in or out of housing and stipends. This survey requires a response by Tuesday May 16. If you do not respond by the deadline you will automatically be opted out of housing and stipends.
In addition, we will be communicating about the decision for assigning or selecting roommates. We'll develop a process for this and communicate it to students as soon as possible.
Please also remember that if you are employed and make more than 200K RWF take home or if you will be beyond Year 3 in your Kepler experience, you are ineligible for housing next year.
Lastly, we'll be communicating move out dates for those currently in housing very soon. For those that are graduating, you will be given a date to move out shortly after graduation. For those those that are not graduating, we'll set a date in July and communicate this as early as possible.
This process is going to take a lot of team work and planning. Please note that we will be striving to meet everyone's expectations along the way and will ask for your patience and feedback throughout the process.
If you have any questions about the survey or opting in or out, please reach out to Beata. For any other inquires, don't hesitate to reach out to me or a member of the staff.
