I worked in residential life while in college and can tell you that placing freshmen in singles is a horrible idea. It leads to isolation and lets mental health issues fester. Some need it but you do not want to place anyone who doesn’t into a room alone especially in their first year.

I agree in that freshmen should get the "experience" at least once. However, the way Stanford has arranged housing has meant that a good number of students will not live in a single for any of their 4 years.

Before you went to college, did you have a bedroom to yourself in your parents' home?

Yet here in the UK it's perfectly normal. When I went to uni in 2000 in our halls there were 15 rooms per floor ber block, 2 of which were twins and 13 were single.

The people in the twins were not happy - they hadn't asked for them.

I knew one person who dropped out in the first 3 months (for mental purposes), and that was someone who shared a room.

Meh. I think you're overstating it. To meet your anecdata, I had both the first college year, and single > double by a large margin.