Cold air sleeping arrangement?
 

One of my pledge sisters transferred to Purdue a couple of years ago and said she slept in a cold air sleeping room. It sounded like a minimum security prison or the orphanage on "Madeline"! Has anyone actually lived in one of the houses that has cold air sleeping?

We had a sleeping porch!
 

My chapter house also had a sleeping porch, also known as cold air sleeping. I LOVED IT! It took my months to get used to sleeping any other way when I graduated. :)

What in the world? Not to sound naive, but is that for people who are hot-natured and need to keep cooler at night? That's probably not it but I know nothing about living in a sorority house since our housing is in the process and we only have chapter rooms right now.

Um at the risk of sounding dumb...what in the world is a cold air sleeping room? I live in Miami, Florida...cold air sleeping to me sounds like a room with an air conditioning unit..and in Florida if you dont have one consider yourself a fried egg by the end of summer. So what excatly is this cold air sleeping???
THANKS!!!

I've never heard the term before, but I'm assuming it is when you have a large room where everybody sleeps, like just a bunch of bunk beds. Then people have their own separate rooms that are used as living areas.

What Brian describes is what I've always heard called a "sleeping porch," although I've never seen one that was actually a porch - they're just big rooms.

I don't know how anyone can do that. I cannot sleep if someone is snoring, and imagine if you have a dozen or two people all sleeping in the same room. No thanks!

It sounds creepy to me because that reminds me of when that term was used for the sleeping arrangement at the sorority house in Florida where Ted Bundy killed a girl.

Cold air and sleeping porches are the same thing. It is a large room where all the girls sleep and there are bunkbeds. You don't keep your belongings in there. It is supposedly kept cold to prevent the spread of germs or something. I am jurst curious because I cannot sleep in the cold!!!! Eek!!!!

Weird. I hope when we get our house in the next couple years that we don't have an arrangement like that. I am *very* cold-natured, and I would have to sleep in a snowsuit practically to keep warm LOL. I doubt we will have it though, because we took a vote on what we would like in a house earlier this semester, and I think most people voted for two-person rooms and a capacity of 40 or more. Supposedly the builders are "talking" to someone in the chapter about what's going on though. Apparantly we're getting a 2nd Greek Row across the street from the original which will be mostly sororities, but the newest IFC group that just formed here will also have their house there. I can't wait!!! :)

Question, do most houses have sleeping porches in addition to regular bedrooms? I know the U of M AGD house has a sleeping porch that is basically like a hangout/meeting room for the new members but the sisters have regular bedrooms.

We have a sleeping porch and I just LOVE it. It's wonderful. It took me a few nights to get used to, but now it's wonderful.

The bedrooms in our house are very small, and there's just no room for two beds in most of them - so like my room right now has 2 desks, 2 dressers, and one bed - my roomie Rachel normally sleeps in the bed in the room (because she snores) and I sleep on my bed in the porch.

It's chilly on our porch, but we actually have two and one is kept about 5 degrees colder than the other one. I switched to the cold one for two nights and was too cold to sleep! But I like getting all bundled up in my nice warm flannel PJs and cuddling up under blankets to sleep, so I love my sleeping porch. It works out really well.

I don't know how many other sorority houses have sleeping porches... I know the Kappa house at UF has one...

here at IU, these are called cold dorms, and are almost in every house. there are also warm dorms though. they are indeed big rooms with just bunches of bunk beds. the air is cranked up, and windows are left open in the window. they are like this to keep down the spread of colds and stuff, by freezing out the germs i guess! they are also kept dark at almost all times. all of the girls swear by their electric blankets! i dont like the idea either, but most girls during rush said they loved it, because you could fall asleep easily, since no one was allowed to talk or what not in there....but who knows! :)

roxydiva

My sorority house doesn't have a sleeping porch but I know that a few houses at FSU do have them. I know at the Alpha Gam house it's as someone described....one bed, 2 desks, etc in the room and the girls kept their stuff there and slept on the porch. Most of my Alpha Gam friends really liked that arrangement too.

Ok you know you would expect Florida to be considered part of the "South" but apparently things are MUCH different!
While that sounds super relaxing..almost like sleeping in a freezer of beds...here in Miami all you have to do is crank the AC and it is kinda the same thing..BUT I like the idea of how its all quiet and dark and cold and no one can talk...I know here in my dorm my roomate (my pledge sister) snores super loud and sometimes doesnt go to bed until really late leaving the TV and lghts on or talking loud on the phone.. so im left tossing and turning in bed until I finally pass out..it was such a problem this past semester the docter perscribed me sleeping pills..
the actual thought of thisreally cold room as we speak makes me want to go to bed!! :)
If we had a house here I would think a thing like that would be nice to have...
ok wait ...also by porch do you mean its actually outside?? HMM I dunno these new phangled ideas are very interesting to this Miamian...
LOL :D

We have two Porches. Both are 24-hour quiet and lights off, so if you want to take a nap in the middle of the day, you can. We have our own rooms with all our stuff in there, but we don't sleep in them. For years we had to have the windows open because of fire codes, but recently they changed it so we can close them now. The funny thing is after years of complaining about how cold it was, we still keep them open. We have enough plugs so that everyone can have an electric blanket (and believe me, winter's in Pullman get cold, so everone does have one!) We also have a timer so that you can keep your blanket on and it'll turn back on at around 9 or so, and when you go to bed, it's already all toasty! I personally like the porches because then you don't have to deal with people or roomates in your room if you want to sleep. I can't imagine any other way to sleep. Most of the Chapters here have porches as well.

We had a sleeping porch when I pledged but voted to turn it into bedrooms before I moved into the house my sophomore year. My freshman year I used to sleep in the porch after hanging out at the house sometimes. It was a great place to nap or study b/c of the 24 hour quiet hours. We didn't keep ours cold b/c we didn't have air conditioning in the house (although we definitely could have used it).

Actually now that I'm reading mroe about it, that doesn't sound all that bad. Especially considering that since I'm an only child I've had a difficult time being in a dorm room and having to be accustomed to noise and light. I used to not be able to go to sleep unless there was complete silence, and even now I wake up if my roomie is typing on her computer or if she gets out of bed... I'm a veeerrrry light sleeper. Oh well, our houses are a couple years away and we've already voted on the way for everything to be arraganged even though we haven't completley tallied the votes.

I was in Pullman too!
 

I also went to school in Pullman, it can get COLD!!! But the warmth of electric blankets and flannel PJs keep you warm. We had rooms with our closets and desks and one bed in the room. You slept there if you were sick or were keeping other up - like snoring.

Again, I LOVED IT! It is only cold getting into bed but you fall asleep easily... The best nights sleep ever!:D

Here at the UA almost all the 12 houses have sleeping porches. Only Alpha Chi, AEPhi, and DG don't.

Calling them porches always confuses people... hee hee hee. They're not outside, they're very much inside. They're just a big cold dark room full of bunkbeds.

Cold Airs
 

At Iowa State, the cold air is really common, and most of the houses here have cold air sleeping arrangement. Our house has one as well, and I love it! Especially in the winter time, it is extremely cold (Iowa ...), but once you cuddle up under your blankets (I have one sleeping bag and two blankets), you feel like really protected and safe. Warmth of the pillow :D

Even though I've read everyone's great experiences, I couldn't imagine such a sleeping situation!! I think there's only one house here that may have that situation, but I'm not familiar with them. Personally, I like having rooms with beds and desks, but, I've never seen sleeping porches, so who knows! Strange though...

How do guys in fraternities feel about the "cold dorms"?

I know a number of houses here at IU have them (my chapter doesnt). Alumni tend to like them because they greatly improve the house's capacity.

Younger guys (i.e. new initiates who are usually forced to live in them) tend to not like them because of lack of privacy and personal space.

Other guys tend to find the idea of sleeping in a large room with 20+ other guys...well gay.

I personally wouldnt mind a cold dorm if it increases the capacity and manpower of my house. Also, I have 2 roommates now and its a lot of fun. It's been like 8 months of summer camp!

XP2k

I was picturing all these poor sorority sisters sleeping outdoors on a porch with their teeth chattering. I went to school in upstate NY so this could lead to frostbite. :p

LMAO! Sorry that is a similar image to what I had b4 it was explained & I though it was funny. :D

I've had people ask what we do when it rains... "Don't all your beds get wet??" Hee hee hee... :)

Another thread to bump, just because it's interesting!

At IU, like a couple people said, most of the houses do have the cold dorm/warm dorm arrangement. Only AEPhi, Chi Omega, Delta Zeta, and ZTA don't (that I know of). Some of the houses do have it where you can either sleep in your room or in the cold dorm (for example, Delta Gamma, Tri Delt and AXiD)...they'll have, say, three to a room and two beds or something. (yes, I asked about this when I rushed! :D) ADPi and AOPi's new house weren't built back then (ADPi's was being built) so I don't know about those...maybe someone from IU can enlighten me. (the old AOPi house had the cold dorm/warm dorm thing)

A lot of girls seem to love it but I know it would have driven me nuts!

Sorry, While I sleep with the Heat turned down and did sleep in a dungeon bunk room as a Pledge from another Fraternity other than mine, it may have been fun, But, it is different!:)

At the end of our old house that leaked like a sieve from the weather, it was not much fun for having a House Corp. meeting in the Ligon Room where we all wore coats and started snowing like hell outside!:( This is how all of the brothers werre as did not have enough money to pay the bills!

While it may have brought them together, it is tuff on Recruitment for PNM!:o :(

House is now gone!

I hope We can get a new one built starting next year!;)

At Ole Miss, our house had separate rooms that had two beds/closets/desks, etc.

I may be wrong, but I believe that all of the houses were like this. I had never heard of "cold-air rooms/porches."

Is this a mid-western thing? It seems like a lot of places around here do it. Just a question.

sounds really relaxing
 

These "cold porches" sound good to me! I have a question though. If it's 24 hour quiet, how do you wake up for classes? Are you allowed to have an alarm clock?

preciousjeni

We have a wakeup system from 6:30 until 7:45. You can choose to be woken up at 6:30, 7:00 or 7:30. We have a lot of pharmacy majors that all have 8AM classes so the majority of the girls in the cold dorm wake up at those times. After those times you can use an alarm clock but you must be courteous.

:D

im gonna say that more guys snore then the women.. i could be wrong... but if you have like 5 brothers who snore.. i would go nuts!!!! how do you ladies with these porches deal with snoring...

We have a few rooms with beds but for the most part there isn't a problem with snoring until certain people get sick. Usually those girls end up sleeping on the couch in their rooms.

A girl in one of my classes years ago was a DG and she was telling me they had a similar wakeup system...no alarms til a certain time, girls would sign up for times they wanted to be woken up, etc. I always wondered how those girls woke up to do wake-up duty: was there a special room for them to sleep in so their alarms could go off? I also am curious how it's decided who does it: by seniority (or lack thereof), does everyone take a turn, is it the responsibility of the girls who sleep in their rooms instead of the dorm or is it by volunteering?

Also, jharb, what happens if a girl wants to wake up earlier than 6:30?

The way we do it is you can set your alarm for before then but if you want to get up from 6:30-7:45 you use the wake up system. Same with getting up after 7:45. The people who do the wakeups are generally girls who haven't done their house duties yet. Each girl who lives in the house must complete three house duties before graduating. The house duties range from doing weekend dishes, taking out weekend trash, to wakeups. I've never done wakeups, instead I've done dishes, taken out the trash and cleaned out the kitchenette. Other girls will take 6:30, 7:00 and 7:30 wakeups on a Tuesday (or some other day) and have all three of their house duties done for their time in the house. Girls who have 7:00 wakeups would be woken up by the girl doing the 6:30 wakeups.

I hope that explains it!

In the northeast (New England) these sleeping rooms are called "Rams" (not sure why). I was told they were created for insurance reasons.

I slept in one at the Lambda Chi Alpha (Beta chapter) House at U. Maine, Orono back in the '70s. The first floor was all common rooms, kitchen, dining room. The second floor had study rooms shared by two brothers each, with all their personal stuff. The third floor was like a barracks, running the length of the building.

Just rows of beds. The windows are open 365 days a year. Everyone has an electric blanket on his bed. In the winter, snow will drift in the room. Yes, no kidding! Dig around for your shoes or slippers.

In the morning, there is a brother stationed outside the door with a list of wake-up times. He discreetly shakes each guy at the appointed time, who then runs like hell downstairs where it's warm.

I didn't make this up. I stayed in the Ram one night. Emphasis on ONE. I was just visiting. I have heard they also have a similar arrangement at Syracuse. Perhaps ironically, Florida would be too hot for this.

Jono

There was a coed GLO at my school that had this type of sleeping arrangement. Everyone slept in the attic - girls at one end, guys at the other. (no alarm clocks allowed) Each resident also had a room in the house (2-4 people per room) where s/he would keep a desk, chair, computer, etc. Each night, one person would sleep in a separate bedroom with an alarm set for 5:30 or something, and it was his/her job to go around and wake everyone at his or her requested time. This duty rotated among all the members... It was called "arousal" :p

I didn't even rush there. I value my privacy too much ;)

Arousal!!! I love that. Only ones who could beat that are the British, who "knock you up" in the morning :eek:

Seriously, does anyone know why this saves on insurance premiums? Or maybe that's not the real reason.

Jono

We do it because it saves space in a room. You can fit four desks, closets and dressers in a room and not have to worry about beds! :D