And there are few better ways to find a different world view to learn from than living with a member of the opposite sex.

Students groups, such as the Residence Halls Association, or RHA, and ASMSU, MSU’s undergraduate student government, passed bills in the spring supporting a gender-neutral housing policy at MSU.

According to the RHA President, Sarah Pomeroy, more than 50 universities across the nation already have enacted a policy of gender-neutral housing. Not all, but most students support the idea of it, according to the 2010 Floor Community Survey, about 67 percent of students support gender-neutral housing.

The idea of gender-neutral housing is plausible and helps the variety of student experience of MSU, so it’s definitely something the university should consider.

Gender-neutral housing only would add to the student experience and broaden the base of new people for students to meet when they first arrive at MSU. For whatever reason, MSU clearly doesn’t feel confident about implementing gender-neutral housing. By implementing it on a trial basis, MSU truly can get a sense of how the student population would react and interact when presented with gender-neutral housing. Ultimately, it can’t hurt the university to enact it on a trial basis on a single floor or in a single dorm.

Housing sensibilities should be left up to students; it’s their living area, and they should be able to live with people they feel comfortable with.

There might be tension about allowing male and female students to live together initially. A trial would show whether male and female students can live in the same halls and in the same rooms without any issues.

It’s not as if women aren’t allowed on men’s floors and vice versa. There’s individual diffusion of students from floor to floor inside all dorms. MSU isn’t the military — male and female students are allowed to be in the same room after hours already. So why can’t they live in the same room all the time if that’s their choice?

If a trial period of gender-neutral housing is successful, it doesn’t mean all dorms immediately have to switch to that. Also, students who choose not to support it also wouldn’t be required to live in gender-neutral dorms. Enacting the policy merely creates another housing option for students when looking at MSU.

Of course, neither the current housing system nor gender-neutral housing — or any housing policy, for that matter — will create a utopia for students.

But by not at least testing a policy students are interested in, the university is neglecting the possibility of making students’ living experience better.