When I started at UCLA 30 years ago(!), housing was already expensive and limited. Surprisingly, the article says UCLA actually has enough rooms to guarantee housing for 4 years for freshmen and 2 years for junior transfers. But many other UCs don’t have enough dorm space and students need to find off-campus housing in some of the nation’s most expensive markets.
I’m curious if anyone here has some insight on how students are dealing with the situation. Living in a trailer seems sub-optimal.
Increasing campus enrollment to make room for increased numbers of students who want to attend a UC means more students looking for housing.
Most UC campuses are in built up areas with already crowded housing and anti-development / anti-more-students NIMBYs who influence local politics.
On-campus housing construction is always playing catch-up to increasing campus enrollment. There is often NIMBY opposition, but some high density housing proposals are controversial for non-NIMBY reasons (e.g. Munger Hall and UCSB).
UC Merced where there is plenty of space is not desired by most of those who want to attend a UC.
I probably graduated around the time you started. When I was at UCLA, housing was only available to Freshman and a tiny percentage beyond Freshman year who either were RA’s or in dorm government. Many ran for election for the purpose of remaining eligible for housing. And the housing many got was forced triples in decades old rooms designed for 2, with facilities (showers, laundry, cafeterias) designed for far fewer students.
But UCLA housing is amazing since then. I visited a few years back when my daughter was there for a summer camp. They turned the entire hill into a housing mega village. And upgraded the food 10x.
As for the other UC’s now, seems like they are stuck in the middle of conflicting agendas from others. The state is pressing them to accept more students but providing no solutions for how to do so. And local residents and municipalities are pushing. back at any solution for more housing. Witness Berkeley, where the oppose both more housing on campus and off campus. Basically it’s a game of chicken between the states and the local governments with the UC’s and their students as fodder in their war.
UCSD is constantly in building mode. There has been a lot of change to upgrade and build new dorms. I don’t see it on a daily basis, but I was surprised at how much non-stop building is going on.
UC Irvine significantly over enrolled a few years ago and our friends’ freshman daughter was left without housing. They had to find off campus housing at significant expense. I’ve heard of nightmare situations at Berkeley and UCSB.