I'm going abroad during my junior year.  What do I do?

So what happens when you go abroad?  You are still guaranteed housing for that year when you come back, as long as you enter the draw in the preceding spring.  This is because Stanford University guarantees all undergraduates at least four years of housing.  If you're planning on going abroad next year, make sure you still enter the draw in the spring.  Otherwise, you might not have housing when you come back from being abroad.  When you do come back, you will be entering the waiting-list with the draw number that you drew the previous spring.  The bottom line is, if you want decent housing, enter the draw the preceding spring anyways.

For more details on what to do for each specific quarter you're going to be away, check out the Going Away page.

So how does this waiting-list thing work?

The waiting list is a list for students who are guaranteed housing, but could not be assigned.  These include students coming back from being abroad.  Over the summer, as other students cancel their housing assignments, the Stanford Housing office will contact you and assign you to one of those vacancies.  Until then, you will not know where you will be living, and there is not much you can do about it except wait.  However, if you are guaranteed housing, then you will be assigned to live somewhere, so you will not have to camp out in the library all quarter.

I want to be a dorm staff.  What do I need to do?

There are a large variety of different resident staff positions, but the application process is very similar for all of them.  When the time comes, you should go to the residential job application website and fill in and submit the appropriate forms.  It is important to start checking the website, because the residential education department is not have a very strong publicity campaign in this area.  In fact, only about 300 to 400 students apply each year for the approximately 200 spots as RAs.  For more information on what it takes to be a resident staff, check out the Dorm Staff page.