The heat and noise issue can vary from roommate to roommate. My freshman year, I ran two gaming machines 24/7 and my roommate didn't mind at all, minus his requests for me to turn the LEDs off at night. However, the power consumption can become an issue. Running those two desktops as well as an assortment of other electronics, I tripped the breaker for room several times, requiring me to call maintenance to reset it every time. The following year, I lived in a on-campus house (actual house and not dorm) and did not have any problems running any extent of power.
For those saying we are stealing....I don't think its stealing if we are being charged $60K+ a year, especially when housing is overpriced, to use an additional few hundred dollars of power....the quote of a poor college student LOL
It's not stealing if you're running 1 unit since many students use their PCs and other equipment to fund their income as a student. Students who do makeup and spa-work in their dorm use hairdryers and lights. People who run a website use the bandwidth and electricity.
The problem arises if you plug in 5, 10, 15 miners and are pretty much there to make an income rather than learn - then you are violating the housing agreements.
This is all irrelevant to a roomate who will put things in your bed if he/she is unhappy with you...check your toothbrush before putting it in your mouth.
of course, there is an extent to which its not stealing. if you are running an entire 'farm' in there with a whole shelf of miners, then yea, that's stealing. but 5 or 10 marginal miners (S1's?) i think would be fine....when on-campus housing costs twice as much as off-campus and you're required to live on-campus, in terms of what you make off mining, probably won't even make up for the differnce in cost of housing, simply trying to support my education.
I don't see how there's a trade-off between making an income and learning. I can see tehre being a trade-off if mining requires you to pay constant attention and you're skipping classes to mine, but that wouldn't (or atleast, shouldn't) happen. Also, I don't think your own lack of learning violates any housing agreements, different case if you were disturbing others.
as for roommate...case-by-case...was with the same roommate for 3 years running, no problems at all, maybe I'm just lucky.