On Friday, May 23, students learned their fate when Student Housing sent out assignments via email and posted Draw statistics for the 2008-2009 school year — all but 122 students, that is.

An unprecedented 122 upperclassmen guaranteed housing were not assigned housing this Draw cycle.

“The Undergraduate Housing Draw saw an increase of 49 upperclassmen applicants this year, continuing the trend of higher application numbers from last year,” said Executive Director of Student Housing Rodger Whitney in a press release. “This is the highest number of undergraduate applications since 2002. There also was a higher yield in freshmen admits than anticipated.”

Among those unassigned were Caroline Kusin ‘10 and her five draw mates, who received the number 2860. The cutoff for guaranteed housing for women was 2813, and 2892 for men.

“We’re laughing about it because it’s kind of ridiculous,” Kusin said. “Who doesn’t get housing?”

Despite finding humor in their situation, Kusin said she and her draw mates were taken aback by an email from Housing asking them to join the waitlist.

“It was weird,” said Kusin of the additional steps required of her group, “because it was completely their fault. I can’t believe I have to put more effort in just because I got a bad number.”

In response to the additional housing demand, Student Housing announced a new option for those undergraduates applying to the autumn waitlist or seeking reassignment for autumn quarter. These students may live in Crothers during autumn quarter and Xanadu for winter and spring quarters.

For those assigned, among the top choices in the Draw for both men and women were Jerry, 680 Lomita, BOB and Mars. The cut-off numbers for these houses decreased significantly from previous years. For example, the cut-off Draw number for a group of four females drawing into 680 Lomita decreased from 230 in the 2007-2008 school year to 143 in the 2008-2009 school year.

The decreased cut-off numbers for Row houses this year caused some students with reasonably good Draw numbers to miss living on the Row.

Andrew Chang ‘11, who drew in a group of six males, received the draw number 534 but was assigned to Toyon, which had a cut-off of 1591 for a draw group of 6 males with priority last year. This year, 435 was the highest number for a group of 6 males hoping to be placed in any self-op.

“Toyon was our 14th choice,” Chang said. “We really wanted to live in Narnia or 717, but we also put Jerry, BOB, Grove, Phi Sig and just about every Row house on our preferences before Toyon.”

In addition to self-ops, co-ops on the Row were also popular this year.

“Most [co-ops] filled out of both priority and preferred status,” said Student Housing University Manager Sue Nunan in a press release.

The newly implemented Gender Neutral Housing pilot program in Terra, Narnia, Castano and Mirrielees did not significantly affect the popularity of these residences in the undergraduate Draw.

“Eighty-six students — about 2 percent of those assigned — who listed an interest in gender neutral housing were assigned to one of the four undergraduate gender neutral housing locations,” Whitney said. “Assignments for gender neutral housing will take place at the in-house Draws for these residences.”

“The response from graduate students was even higher, with 112 graduate students — about 3 percent of those assigned — listing a gender neutral option as their first choice,” Whitney added. “The graduate pilot program will be housed in Rains apartments.”

Graduate students were also hit by the housing crunch. Just fewer than 90 percent of this year’s 4,896 applicants were assigned housing in the first-round Lottery.

The University will assist a small number of graduate students to obtain off-campus subsidized apartments.

“By autumn of 2009, Munger graduate residences will be open, so there will be additional housing available for graduate students on campus,” Whitney said. “Student Housing will also be offering new low-cost housing options in 2009-2010 to replace Crothers and Crothers Memorial when it is repurposed as an undergraduate building after its planned renovation.”

Draw statistics can be viewed at http://www.stanford.edu/dept/rde/has/applying/upperclass/ucresults/drawstats.html.