At Smith-Steeb Hall, families pulled bedding, bookcases and clothing from SUVS and trucks and piled them into canvas roller carts to get supplies into the dorm Wednesday.
It was the first day of a move-in window for students at Ohio State University marking the start of the 2024-2025 school year, a year that is likely to see one of the largest freshman classes ever at the university.
Parent Gina Khalil of Akron was helping to move her sophomore daughter, Anna Khalil, into Smith-Steeb. She said it’s easier the second time around.
Khalil said she’d also heard about the large incoming class, but she didn’t think it would affect Anna’s dorm experience.
“I think it's more people who are in some of the other dorms that used to be two, and now it's four,” Gina Khalil said, adding that her daughter has just one roommate.
Over at Lincoln tower, it was a different story.
“I'm living with 15 other girls, so that'll be new,” said incoming freshman Farah Leblanc of southern Maryland. “I have a lot of stuff. So, it'll be hard fitting everything in. But we'll make it work. It'll be fine.”
Ohio State University received around 80,000 applications for this school year. The university’s largest freshman class to date was in 2020 with 8,600 first-year students starting on the main campus in Columbus and another 2,700 first-year students starting at regional campuses.
Last year’s incoming class had about 10,550 students total at all of Ohio State’s campuses.
Spokesman David Isaacs said the university won't have an exact headcount of this year's freshman until it does a census in mid-September, but the incoming class appears to be a big one. Isaacs said the dorms can handle the influx.
“We've built in the flexibility to be able to accommodate this. We're ready,” Isaacs said.
Ohio State’s main campus has about 40 residence halls.
Matt Brown of Tiffin, Ohio, was helping move his daughter, Brooke, into Lincoln Tower. He described her suite: “So, they have four girls, and there's 16 of them on that total space area and there's like four quads there. So, I looked it over. I think it's pretty cool.”
The suites also have bathrooms with multiple toilet stalls and sinks.
Brown said the space might be “tight.”
"But I mean, it is what it is. Yeah. It's okay. It should be okay. I mean, you're gonna meet a lot of people,” Brown said.
Leblanc said even though she’d hoped to live in a dorm with fewer people, she’s excited to start the year.
“No college dorm is going to be perfect. And especially at a school with so many people, and they have to have so many people. They're going to have to make accommodations,” Leblanc said. “So, I mean, just like make the best of your situation that you're living in and just try to be positive.”
