Overview

The draw is round one in the housing assignment process.  It is meant to assign on campus housing to students in as fair a manner as possible.  It uses a lottery-like system, where students are assigned a draw number, which corresponds to your position in line in picking your housing.  The smaller your number, the better.  The bigger your number, the worse.  There are various exceptions, but most people who want housing must enter the Draw, or lottery in order to be assigned housing for the next academic year.

It is also important to note that the draw can refer to two different kinds of draws.  Usually, it refers to this university-wide lottery system to assign undergraduates to residence buildings.  However, it can also refer to the in-house draw, which is a system by which students are assigned to the exact room in the building they have been assigned to.  In other words, once you get into a residence like Branner, you still need to be assigned to the room you will live in.  This is accomplished through this in-house draw, which usually takes place the week after your buliding assignments come out.

The Tier System

When you sign up for housing, you can select a "Tier".  A "Tier" is a range of draw numbers in which your draw number is guaranteed to be in.

• Tier 1 (Draw numbers 1~1000)
• Tier 2 (Draw numbers 1001-2000)
• Tier 3 (Draw numbers 2001-3000)
• Tier 4 (Draw numbers 3001-4000)  (does not apply to most students)
  

As you can see, Tier 1 is the best range, and gives you the highest probability of getting into the dorms you want.  If you pick Tier 2, then your draw number is guaranteed to be in the range 1001-2000.

Here's the catch.

• Rising freshman cannot pick Tier 1
• You can only use Tier 1 once
  
• You have to use Tier 3 once

Draw Groups

A draw group is a group of friends that you enter the draw with, so you all get the exact same draw number.  It also means that your entire draw group will be placed in the same dormitory, except in a few special cases.  However, there are a few things to remember:

• The larger your group, the less likely you are to get into the dormitory of your choice.  When you fill in the draw application, you have to specify up to what point you prefer maintaining a group over better housing.  If this number is 73, the total number of residence choices, your group will be kept together until the very end.  However, in the absolute worst case scenario, you may still get split up if you opt to do so.  This will only happen if you draw Tier 3.  This happens because there just will not be enough room anywhere for your entire group to go in its entirety.
• It is possible that you will have to room with somebody outside of your draw group.  Suppose you drew with one other friend, but in the in-house draw, you get assigned to a two-room triple.  The RAs and RFs will make sure to assign another person in addition to you two in order to fill up all vacancies.  They simply will not let you take a two-room triple for two people.
  

Ranking Housing Options

Basically, rank the dorms in the order of your preference for them.  If really you want to be in Bob, put it as #1.  Your tier and draw number should not affect your ranking.  Why?  Because you can rank all 73 possible residences, so you will always be placed in the first available dormitory that is the highest up in your list.

How do I choose what room I live in?

In most dormitories, you choose your room in the in-house draw--a second draw of sorts.  Once your draw group gets into a residence, you then select your room in order by seniority, and then by draw number.  Note that you choose your roommate at this point.  This does not have to be somebody in your draw group.  However, if a senior

Why do we even have "Tiers"?

If we had no tiers, then you could get a draw number ranging between 1 and 4000.  That is a huge range, and you probably want to have more control over where in that range you are going to be.  In particular, many students often take a quarter or two off or abroad.  For them, it would be better to be able to prefer bad housing for certain years, and better housing for years when they will be on campus the entire year.

Wait, what's Tier 4?

Tier 4 is for students who are not guaranteed housing.  Every single Stanford students is guaranteed 4 years of housing.  Then how can you be not guaranteed?  If you take a year off for example, but signed up for housing for that year anyway, then you lose a year of guaranteed housing, even though you never lived on campus.  If you've lived on campus every year of your Stanford career, then do not worry about this.  It does not apply to you.  For more details, visit the page on Stanford's housing guarantee.