Bloomington Herald-Times
August 23, 2013
IU's new Rose Avenue Residence Center 'like a hotel'
By Jon Blau
Jacob Ziluck dreamt, like many incoming freshmen, of a dorm in the northwest corner of campus. He wanted to join the thousands of students living in Briscoe or McNutt residence centers, the dorms in the thick of the action and a short walk from Assembly Hall.
But those spaces filled, leaving him to turn to Indiana University's newest dorm, Rose Avenue Residence Center. Opening this fall, it rooms fewer people, about 440 freshmen and sophomores, and he didn't know what to make of its location on the southeast side.
Arriving from South Florida and moving in with his roommate, Sam Wolfson, they didn't know what to expect. They saw the elevators, an improvement over the stairs at McNutt. They saw the lounges with big TVs yet to come, the new basketball courts, the fitness room that will hold two treadmills and an elliptical.
"It's like a hotel," Ziluck said, no longer focused on Briscoe or McNutt. "I guess things happen for a reason."
Rose Avenue, a $38 million project, comes with its own price for students who live there, however. On the same "upscale" pricing level as Briscoe, which was renovated last year, a double room at Rose Avenue could cost anywhere from $7,049 to $7,420 for two semesters. The rest of the university's facilities average about $6,000, according to IU's Residential Programs and Services Department.
The new residence center offers a coffee house, music practice rooms, an academic advisor on-site, a music and movies library, and a computer center with lounge chairs and multiple plug-ins for laptops. Two-thirds of its residents are freshmen.
And nearby in Forest Residence Center, IU is working to open a dining area called "The Restaurants at Woodland," where students will be able to choose from a range of options at nine different stations; they could use their meal points on a steak cooked to order, or a pizza. Or, they can experiment at a restaurant called "Fusion," which will feature everything from Korean to Mediterranean to Ethiopian dishes.
"It will be a good lesson on budgeting meal points for some of these students," said Jenny Minsberg, an assistant manager at Rose Avenue.
