A first list of possible resident experiences was derived from programmatic documents, interviews and a walkthrough with administrators, literature and previous work in evaluation and design. The organization of this list followed five general categories of human experience for three scales of the setting (room & corridor, bathroom, and public spaces)

• Wayfinding: At times finding one's way in a setting can be unduly difficult. One evaluates which particular users and which particular destinations are the source of existing or potential wayfinding problems.
• Visual and Non-Visual Aesthetics: These environmental activities involve a kind of inherent or personally developed response to natural and architectural forms which are perceptually pleasurable or unpleasurable. Visual pattern, texture, color, sound, aroma, warmth, coolness, all can be stimulating. Exploration of an environment is an important part of these experiences.
• Task-Performance: Here one evaluates the way the efficiency of actual physical tasks depends upon the environment as a "tool", e.g. producing things, moving people and objects, storing goods or information, communicating with others, making places secure, avoiding injury, reducing interruption or disturbance while working.
• Social Territories: Which environmental activities have as a primary intention the maintenance of social identities and organization of individuals and/or groups? Which aspects of the environment are appropriated for privacy, spontaneous socialization, hierarchical authority?
• Cultural Expression: How do people attach and use associational/symbolic meaning in a setting? How do historical references, artwork (beyond visual aesthetics), personalization, organizational or professional themes or religious artifacts help influence values or belief? Are there formal, ritual-like activities associated with such portions of the environment?

Using the first list of possible activities or experiences as prompts, discussion was recorded and transcribed with residents representing all the 19 wings of the hall. Prior to the discussion, students were asked to indicate on a form how often they used a list of public spaces for studying or socializing. The two hour discussion with a group of custodians was recorded in note form.

A less formalized understanding of residence experience in La Paz resulted from personal observation during the many visits to and through the setting at different times of day and night

Based upon a refinement of the list of experiences, after interviews and observation, a fully participatory web site intended to extend the evaluation process to all the residents of the hall. Able to enter the site via their room number, the participant could see plans and images from each scale (rooms & corridor, bathrooms, public spaces). For each a menu of possible experiences and activities allowed the resident to make and see other comments about how the building worked in terms of a particular issue. Students could also enter and discuss additional activities. Because of difficulties in navigating easily through the site, timing of its availability in the academic year, lack of preloaded commentaries, and perhaps other reasons, the site did not fulfill its intended use. A traditional survey was conducted instead.

The final survey distributed to the entire La Paz population contained 96 total issues organized into experiental categories for each of the scales (rooms & corridors, bathrooms, public spaces). Fifty-seven students completed the survey, indicating for each issue a degree of importance on a scale of 1-3. One final task was to indicate the top 10 most important issues of the entire 96.