As students settle into their rooms and routines, the den on the second floor of Elm Hall holds four of the nearly 370 freshmen who are still living out of their suitcases.

Temporary housing, they said, means camping out among unpacked boxes in the 18-by-16-foot den, waiting for their permanent residence hall assignments.

“I turned in my housing late,” said Sarah Lala, freshman in art and design.

“It’s a pain in the butt. The big room is nice, but we have to move again.”

The overflow in housing is partially due to the record enrollment and a large incoming freshmen class, Registrar Kathleen Jones said.

“Enrollment is going to be very strong,” she said. “What we had projected last year was 27,270 for this fall. We will be higher than that number, but we won’t know until after the 10th day of enrollment.”

Randy Alexander, residence department director, said the high demand for a limited number of beds for underclassmen is the cause of the housing overflow.

“Enrollment is up, and freshmen are the largest number of people in the residence halls,” Alexander said.

“Also, we have more upperclassmen that are staying on campus because of Hawthorn Court.”

The destruction of the north end of Helser Hall accounted for a loss of 375 beds, Alexander said.

The Wilson Hall double-occupancy rooms were renovated into single-occupancy rooms, which are not available for freshman. The change took away 285 beds.

The loss of the 660 dorm beds was countered by the creation of about 1600 apartment beds in Hawthorn Court, Alexander said.

The dens of residence halls are serving as temporary homes for many freshmen to account for the space demands.

“We always start with the dens in Towers, because there’s more space,” Alexander said. “But we prepared the dens in all of the residence halls.”

Most of the people will not stay in the dens long, he said.

“We have already begun moving people out of temporary housing as openings occur,” Alexander said.

“I can’t predict when we will have everyone out, but based on past history, probably around Nov. 1.”

Alexander said some sophomores with good records and high GPAs have been given the option to move to Hawthorn Court in order to free up more dorm rooms for underclassmen.

As enrollment cancellations become finalized and students move into fraternity or sorority houses, spaces will open up and students will move into permanent housing.

Stacy Cornish, freshman in liberal arts and sciences and resident of the Elm Hall den, said she could move into a permanent room any day.

“We have to move to our permanent rooms, but we don’t know when,” she said.

“I haven’t unpacked all of the way.”