Author: Tyler Kearn
What’s Occidental going to do when it can’t house all of its students? The question is a ticking time-bomb. Oxy is heading towards a housing crunch as the largest freshman class to ever enter Oxy, the class of 2013, is subject to the new requirement that students must live on campus for their first three years.
Currently, Oxy doesn’t guarantee seniors housing, but pretty much any student who wants to live on campus is able to. This is greatly helped by the recent construction of Rangeview, which increased Occidental’s housing capacity dramatically. It’s also helped by the fact that, while the school has admitted 578 first-year students, it can force them into triples for their first two years here.
However, by the time the class of 2013 reaches its junior year, many will not be willing to put up with a double or a triple again, but all of them will be forced to live on campus due to the new policy. This is going to eat up the available housing, and the school is going to be forced to give all available rooms to first-years, sophomores and juniors. Since they are required to live on campus, the school must provide housing to them first.
There will still be some space for the seniors, but if large numbers want to live on campus there might not be enough. It boils down to this: For the first time that anyone can remember, the school could be forced to deny housing to students who want it.
This is clearly a problem, and it could be exacerbated if the school decides to let in another class as large as the class of 2013. While admitting a class size this large was unavoidable and unforeseeable this year (Dean Eric Frank told the Weekly back in September that the school overshot its admission target by 113), it’s a possibility that the school will intentionally let in classes this large in the future. It’s actually a thought that’s under consideration – the extra 100 students has really helped the school’s tuition revenues in this period of economic downturn.
There are a few solutions to the looming housing crunch, and it definitely helps that we can see the problem coming from a couple of years away. The most obvious is to supply more on-campus housing. However, building another residence hall doesn’t seem to be high on the priority list – after all, the school just built Rangeview, and the renovation of Swann Hall and the transformation of the library into an academic commons are currently the top-priority construction projects.
The school has another option, though, and that is to purchase houses in the surrounding neighborhood to utilize as “on-campus” housing (perhaps in the style of Berkus house). The school is already looking to buy residential property in the area for faculty housing and administrative office space, according to Veitch’s email update about the school’s changes to the master plan. These houses could be utilized for student housing instead, taking the pressure off the housing situation on campus.
Another solution is to get rid of the requirement that mandates students live on campus for three years. The point of this requirement is two-fold. One, it helps Oxy become a truly “residential college.” When more students live on campus, it creates a closer community. People develop stronger ties to the school and are more involved with the clubs and events that are going on. Two, it helps the school bring in more revenue without raising tuition (a big deal in a bad economy), since they make a lot more money off of a student who lives on campus.
However, if the housing situation gets to the point where the college is at capacity, then these two purposes are rendered moot – as many people who can live on campus will be, and the school will be bringing in as much revenue as possible. As long as enough upperclassmen request on-campus housing, it might make sense to just abolish the requirement.
Hopefully, with a little good planning and foresight, the school can avoid the worst case scenario here. I’ve been happy living on campus all four years. It would be sad if someone who wanted to do the same was denied the chance.
Tyler Kearn is a senior Economics major. He can be reached at tkearn@oxy.edu.
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