How to Keep Your Dorm Room Clean (Without Annoying Your Roommate)

For many students, it's not even just about cleanliness. Stink and clutter can make concentrating on a research paper or entertaining guests somewhat hard.

So students, especially first-timers, can find themselves in a pickle. It's not hopeless, though. A dorm room can be as clean as you, and your roommate, need it to be. It may take some revision in cleaning habits – and in your needs – but it's doable.

First step: Look around. What about your room is dirtier or messier than you need it to be? Chances are, what you see is going to fall into some pretty standard categories.

Problem: The Smell

Standard cleaning tasks don't change. To keep your space clean, vacuum and dust every one or two weeks. Clean up spills immediately. Wash your linens once a week. If you have a microwaveand mini-fridge, wipe them down with disinfecting cloths regularly, and dump old food from the fridge as soon as you know you won't be eating it.

Here's where tasks start to change: Unless you want your room to smell like whatever you won't be eating, don't throw that food into your little trash can.

Smells can quickly become overwhelming in a small space. To avoid this pitfall, you likely need to alter your habits a little:

• Take your old food right to the dumpster. If you're on the fourth floor, it's good exercise.

• Don't just empty your trash can. Wipe it down with a disinfectant, too. Or better yet, always use a plastic bag as a liner so trash doesn't touch the can. Then you only need to wipe it down when something leaks.

• Keep sweaty or wet clothing and linens separate from regular laundry, preferably in a bag you can tie or seal in some way (a trash bag is good), and clean that stuff as soon as you have enough to justify a wash on the "small load" setting.

• If you smoke, smoke outside. Same goes for any smoking friends.

• When weather permits, open a window to air out the room. This is especially helpful when it's sunny, since sunlight is a natural disinfectant – any rugs or bedding you can hang out the window for an hour would benefit greatly [source: Wieman].

If the room still smells after all that, or you just can't drag yourself outside for that cigarette, try an air freshener or deodorizing spray. Not everyone likes the scent of these products, but they probably smell better than nicotine and sweat.

Now, onto the clutter.

Problem: The Clutter

Two things are going to get you most of the way to a tidy dorm room: organization skills and smart storage choices. Together, they pretty much mean that almost all your stuff is tucked away, and it's tucked away logically. Throwing all your junk in the closet and pushing the door shut doesn't count.

Once you see your dorm room, make a plan. The objectives here are twofold: Keeping it out of sight, and organizing it logically to make it easy as possible to keep it that way.

Start by dividing what you own into categories, and then assess the volume of your stuff and the storage options in your room. Next, determine the best containment strategies.

Study stuff: Is the desk a table, or are there drawers and shelves, too? If there aren't, or if the drawers and shelves aren't enough, invest in a file box, a desktop organizer, and a set of stacking drawers you can fit right next to or underneath the desk. A shelf over the desk can hold textbooks, computer peripherals and other larger items.

Apparel: You probably have a closet and a dresser. If your stuff doesn't fit, try an over-the-door hanging shoe rack, closet organizers with extra shelving, and over-the-door hooks for jackets, scarves and hats. Shallow under-bed boxes are lifesavers, too, especially for bulky winter sweaters.

Bed and bath belongings: Put all of your bathing supplies in a shower caddy, any makeup in a makeup bag or box, and designate a spot for them. Stacking drawers, a wall shelf, or a crate can hold these neatly.

Whenever possible, go double-duty and/or off-the-floor. Anything you can attach to a wall, hang from a ceiling or use for multiple purposes are space savers. Stacking crates and trunks can double as tables and seating, and a light you can hang from the ceiling frees up surface space for jewelry boxes, tissues and other miscellaneous items.

Once you've got the means to tuck everything neatly away where you can easily find it and return it, all that's left is actually using the system – all the time, every day. If you don't take the two seconds to put your books back on the shelf, you might as well have no system at all.

Problem: The Roommate

If want to live in a cleaner space with someone who still talks to you, do this instead:

• Share your cleaning habits and expectations on day one. You might avoid the conflict in the first place.

• Talk to your roommate as soon as the problem comes up. Festering leads to "Clean your mess up, you spoiled, lazy slob!"

• When expressing your displeasure, say "I," not "you," as in, "I like my home to be cleaner than this," not "You're making our room such a mess."

• Be specific about what bothers you and why. Instead of "Jeez, would you clean up after yourself?" try "Would you please put your leftovers in the dumpster instead of the trash can? The smell of old food really bothers me."

• Set up, together, a cleaning schedule that addresses both of your needs. Maybe you take care of the big jobs on Sunday together so you don't nag her about them the rest of the week. Rotate tasks, and be flexible about trading jobs if there's something you don't mind but your roommate particularly hates doing.

Hopefully, your roommate is someone who knows how to compromise and cares about other people's needs. If so, you may be able to get a little bit closer to the tiny dorm room of your dreams.

If not, chalk it up to character-building, get the heck out in May, and room with someone more like yourself next year. A "clean type."

#roomate #dormlife #hack