Dorm Room Checklist

Lots of kids young people have been dropped off at college already. Yikes. In mid-August? That’s early. Thank goodness, we still have another 10 days before our own drop-off. My son and I have still not crossed off most items on the door-room-basics shopping list.

I feel wholly unprepared for this stage in his life. As our oldest, he’s the first one to head to college and away from home. Though missing him will be the (my) largest issue ( I never expected to have a teenager I’d want to be around), getting him prepared for dorm life is a whole other matter. My husband and I both went to college in our hometown and lived at home, so we can’t even rely on our personal experience to tell him what to expect, and more immediately pressing, what might be needed to furnish his dorm room comfortably.

In the – likely? – event that, like me, you still have dorm room shopping left to do, I thought that I’d share some of the more useful dorm room checklists that I have found online.  Why reinvent the wheel. These two checklists, picked from dozens, are the winners. They are thorough… (and more legible than our chicken-scratch version):

• The Off-to-College Checklist from the College Board website.
• A Dorm Room Supply List from Claremont Colleges

We are editing these lists, of course. I know that my son’s dorm room, to be shared with another freshman, will be a tiny 84 sq. ft. and that surface space will be at a premium. So looking for multi-tasking pieces is a must. For example, he won’t be bringing an alarm clock (why consume 10 square inches?) when his phone can be used as such. The classic storage ottoman will serve, indeed, as storage, as seating and as the occasional table with a tray resting on top. The Ikea Dave laptop table mentioned by Audrey last week is a must too. And, we won’t be including items that he’ll just have to borrow from other kids, like an iron, for the couple of times when he might need one. He’ll have to find the tidy floormate that has one. And, we’re definitely getting the 3M Command wall hooks (the walls are cinder blocks, nothing being nailed in there…) for him to hang whatever can be hung to save space.

Only the young can live like this. In pulling a Tim Gunn, I say we’ll just have to make it work!