However, Residence Life also posed the question of whether these students should be given better lottery numbers to make up for living in the overcrowd rooms. This proposal would be unfair to other students. ORL doesn't provide better numbers for students who have had to live in Dillard or were faced with an equally bad housing situation. There doesn't seem to be any reason to start now. It would only seem fair that the answer to this is social standing.
Registration is an academic exercise.
Those with the most credits have raised themselves to a position at which they need to register first to get higher-level classes. Realistically speaking, there should almost be some kind of pecking-order to get housing. Those who have been here for the longest have had to put up with the most in the way of bad housing. They've earned the top spots. Also, the ability to accumulate enough credits to be classified a year higher than your social standing is not equal for everyone on campus.