Georgia State University will offer students an option for co-ed dorm rooms beginning in the fall semester.
The university plans to offer “gender inclusive housing,” in which students can request a roommate regardless of the person’s sex .
The move comes after requests by siblings, opposite-sex friends and LGBT students wanting to live together, said Marilyn De LaRoche, Georgia State’s director of university housing.
GSU is not the first college in Georgia to offer co-ed rooms. Emory University implemented its gender inclusive policy for juniors and seniors in 2011 and expanded it to all students last year. Students can request an assignment in suite-style or apartment-style housing, but housing is not guaranteed. Kennesaw State University began offering gender inclusive housing in fall 2013.
“We make changes all the time on different things that students bring up,” GSU’s De LaRoche said. “More students are coming here who have a different interest and different lifestyle. We call it inclusive because we’re not excluding people of different interests.”
She said, “If we’re going to really honor diversity, we think it’s just time to make that option available.”
Any of the 4,200 students in Georgia State housing wanting the gender inclusive option would have to sign an agreement to participate and be placed in a roommate matching pool. Students not choosing the new option will be assigned dorms through the traditional method, based on sex.
There are 155 colleges and universities in the country that already offer gender inclusive housing options, according to Campus Pride, a national nonprofit organization for student leaders and campus groups advocating for safer environments for LGBT students.
For Georgia State’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students, “they were looking for a level of comfort on campus,” De LaRoche said. “… LGBT students wanted to live with people like themselves, regardless of orientation.”
Kennesaw State’s decision to offer that option also came after continued student requests, Jeff Cooper, KSU’s director of residence life, said in a statement to the AJC. “In order to participate, students must opt in and thus far, only a limited number of students have taken advantage of it,” Cooper said.
Co-ed dorm room policies in other states have met opposition from some conservative groups, lawmakers and parents who view the option as unnecessary, immoral and outside the realm of colleges’ jurisdiction.
De LaRoche said, “There is always opposition to change. Where it will come from, I’m not sure. Right now students are excited about it and we’re getting a lot of positive feedback.”
The new housing option and associated policies will be available to Georgia State students on Jan. 26 when the housing application process opens for the fall semester.
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