I said...Brr! Sorority Cold Rooms Are All the Rage on TikTok, but Is the Tradition Safe?

College is historically marketed as the best time in a traditional (ages 18-22ish) student's life. It's a time of exploration, freedom, and, in many cases, find your people. One successful and generational way to do the latter is to join a fraternity or sorority.

I'll be honest, sororities were never my thing. I remember entering a sorority meetup my freshman year of college and being overwhelmed by the intense perfume smells. Once I learned more about Greek life, I was even less impressed. No shade, but shade.

Since I was never in danger of marking joining a sorority off of my college bucket list, I never realized how some sorority members proudly ride the struggle bus. On TikTok, some people committed to their sororities have shared their experiences of communal living in cold dorm rooms. Let's dive into the chilling story.

Cold rooms, also known as "cold air dorm rooms," date back to the 1900s and were initially "sleep porches." have been around pretty much as long as sororities and fraternities have. Sleep porches were often screened outdoor porches that allowed the students to have a cool breeze when it was hot outdoors.

According to a Refinery29 article written by Julie Rogers about her experience in a cold room, the rooms are rumored to exist for many reasons, including being part of a rumored "blue law" that stated that if too many women lived in a house together with their own rooms, it would be considered a brothel. The author mentioned that there isn't any truth to the rumor, and that it was more likely put in place due to fire codes and to avoid airborne illnesses by keeping the windows open.

While some universities require students in the cold rooms to leave their windows open to bring natural air into the rooms 24/7, other schools have implemented air conditioning to make the rooms extra frigid. The rooms are quite basic, as TikToker @ellagbo explained that multiple women sleep in the bunk-bed style room. The women in the rooms can only bring their sleep items such as blankets or pillows, while all of their other household items were reserved for their "day rooms" which many of them used during the day.

And that's not all! The rooms are intentionally kept pitch-black—overhead lights are scarce, blackout curtains are usually drawn tight at all hours. In some schools, the rooms are chilled to around 62 °F, so cold that residents often sleep with electric blankets or heating pads.

Despite some students not wanting to live in frigid conditions, cold rooms in sorority houses are 100 percent safe and legal, depending on how much you withstand. According to the New York Post, sororities are encouraged to go through their a cold room to foster community in their house. Those who have lived in one, like Julie, even say the rooms have offered them sensational sleep sessions.

"A freezing-cold bunk porch sounds like the last place you’d want to live, but hear me out: Sleeping in the cold dorm is, hands down, the greatest sleep I’ve ever gotten in my life, post-womb," Julie stated.

Although I can think of at least five other ways to improve your sleep, if the girls like it, I love it!