Public universities are spending billions on new residence halls, thanks to a state push to expand living options for low-income students.
Work continues on new student housing at Cal State, Fullerton in Fullerton, CA on Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. The new six-story Sequoia residence hall will bring 510 new beds to campus. A construction boom is underway at college campuses throughout Southern California, adding enough new dorm space to house at least 12,000 undergraduates and put a dent in the region’s student housing shortage.
The housing shortage creates a mad scramble for students and their parents every year to find an affordable berth to sleep and study in, leaving some students vulnerable to rental scams and resulting in shockingly high rates of student homelessness and “housing insecurity.” Even though the La Cañada Flintridge teen had applied early for on-campus housing, she was number 70 or 80 on the waiting list in August, her mother said.
In an effort to alleviate the region’s student housing shortage a construction boom is underway at college campuses throughout Southern California, adding enough new dorm space to house at least 12,000 undergraduates. Thousands of Cal State Fullerton students packed campus on the first day of school in Fullerton on Monday, Aug. 27, 2012.
A construction zone is fenced off on Monday, Nov. 25, 2024 as work continues on a new student housing project at Cal State Long Beach. Workers are busy on a new student housing construction project on Monday, Nov. 25, 2024, at Cal State Fullerton. New student housing is being built close to existing dorms on the campus of Cal State Fullerton, seen here on Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. Six area California State Universities have housing construction projects underway.
Renderings of the new La Playa Hall are visible near existing dorms on Monday, Nov. 25, 2024, at Cal State Long Beach. Faced with the same dilemma next year, the Postma family is already shopping for housing for the fall 2025 semester. A private apartment complex the family is considering charges $2,400 a month for a single room and has a campus shuttle every 15 minutes.
One Bay Area family transferred their daughter to a private school in San Diego rather than wait to see if she could get into campus housing. “A facet of this problem is an affordability challenge,” Douglas said. “Even where they may have housing, there’s a segment of our students that don’t have sufficient financial resources to cover all of the expenses. … That puts them into a status where they’re housing insecure.”
“Just being on campus, you’re not worried about the commute times,” said Ray Murillo, CSU’s interim vice chancellor of student affairs. “… You have more access and more availability for study groups, learning activities, there are study spaces in the housing units, you have better access to the library.”University administrators and state lawmakers have reacted by building more residence halls both on and off campus.
Although traditionally considered commuter schools, California State University campuses also have been adding residence halls, buildingadding space for 2,040 more students. More than 1,700 of those new living spaces will be affordable to low-income students. In 2021, the state approved the affordable housing grant program to to support construction at UCs, CSUs and, for the first time, at community colleges.
The rent premium is most pronounced in L.A. and San Diego counties, Liu said. Public and private campuses with the highest rent premiums include USC , Cal State Long Beach , Chapman University and possibly UC San Diego , Liu found.
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