Living in the dorms is a rite of passage on the Macalester campus. Moving into a new home and meeting neighbors in the hall shape our first college experiences. For many of us, the dorms become more than a place to study and sleep. They are a social space to play games with friends or watch movies with strangers. However, after a few years, many students need new chances to grow.
The current two-year residency requirement mandates the perfect amount of time to live on Macalester campus. After two years, individual students should get to choose whether they want to continue living on campus, or find accommodation elsewhere.
On Dec. 9, 2025, it was announced in the Mac Daily that, beginning with the class of 2030, students will be required to live on campus for the first three years of their Macalester experience. According to the announcement, this new mandate “supports student success by fostering stronger connections, academic achievement and a vibrant residential learning community.”
There are clear holes in this general statement. The extended requirement will rob students of opportunities for growth and new experiences, make future off-campus living more difficult and exhaust systems on campus that are already under stress.
Living on campus provides a stable environment for students to adjust to college life. While living in the dorms, students don’t need to worry about cooking for themselves or doing chores beyond keeping their room clean. It’s essentially an apartment living experience, but with training wheels.
Frankly, my first year living off-campus taught me how to be an adult. It forced me to learn the basics of cooking, cleaning and how to build a grocery list. Junior year may be stressful, but it provided me with the opportunity to adjust to off-campus living before the chaos that senior year brought. I cannot imagine adjusting to a completely new living arrangement while writing a capstone, studying for standardized tests or applying to graduate school. Some people may choose to do this, but making it the expected path creates unnecessary stress on the entire student population. While some people will have access to apartment style living on campus that mirrors the off-campus experience, limited space greatly restricts the number of students able to live there.
Even with the new residence hall, will Macalester actually have the housing space to support this new requirement? And if so, what about dining?
In an interview with The Mac Weekly, Dean of Students Javier Gutierrez claimed the layout of the new residence hall will provide an opportunity to “not have the meal plan be something that’s required;” but, looking at the floor plan found in the Strategic Plan, I doubt this will be possible. Two kitchen spaces per floor of roughly 50 people? This would work if only a few people were cooking at each meal, but if the residents are all cooking for themselves rather than being on a meal plan, those spaces are going to get very busy very quickly.
This new residence hall will supposedly house up to 224 new beds, so what about everyone else? Assuming the number of students in each class year stays roughly the same, there will still be students in older buildings and on the meal plan in their junior year. Using the number of students in the Class of 2029 at the start of this academic year, 536, and generously assuming 60 percent of students will study away during their junior year, that means there are 375 required spaces in residence halls that were not previously mandated. And this does not take into account any seniors who may opt to remain on campus. Even after the 2024 renovation, Cafe Mac is overcrowded and stretched thin.
The Mac Daily post announcing this change claims that it will “[increase] equity by reducing barriers for students who may find the requirements for off-campus lease qualification challenging.” Although the new housing space will be beneficial to many, the new requirement itself hinders this goal. Having the space available for those who want or need it should be the priority. Making it mandatory for juniors just means there is less opportunity for seniors in the same position to continue living on campus. This just pushes the same problem a year down the line.
For some students, based on their financial aid or any other reason, it may be cheaper or easier for them to remain on campus, but that is not the case for everyone. This year, the price to live in a standard residence hall is $9,268. That’s $1,158.50 per month for eight months out of the year. Some off-campus housing can reach as low as $525 per month, including rent and utilities. That’s $6,300 for an entire 12 month lease period.
The real motivation behind the expansion of the housing requirement appears simple: money. The Macalester administration needs to justify the expenses spent to build the new residence hall. Forcing more students to live on campus, undoubtedly at an increased cost to the standard dorms — much like the higher cost of Grand Cambridge Apartments — brings in more money to make up the cost. Unlike many college campuses, Macalester’s location in the city means that students have many off-campus housing options to choose from, and now they are trying to take away that choice.
This increased residency requirement will cause more harm than good, no matter what the administration claims. The new residence hall should provide the opportunity for more students to live on campus in the latter half of their time at Macalester, but it shouldn’t infringe on the choices and growth opportunities students have before they leave college.
