It was the first week of the fall semester for students here at Cal State Monterey Bay (CSUMB), yet 15 students found themselves still on a waitlist as student housing at CSUMB had reached maximum capacity.
The shortage is in the midst of a record number of applications and admissions for fall 2024. According to CSUMB’s Office of Communications, the university “yielded an increase in enrollment for the first time in seven years.”
In response to the dilemma, Interim Vice President for Administration and Finance Alan Fisher sent an email on Aug. 9 to CSUMB’s campus community informing them that students with families were set to be moved to vacant units typically used for employees. Changes including, “double to triple occupancy, triple to quad occupancy, and [adjustments to] some Frederick Park housing options from two-person to three-person assignments,” were made to main campus housing.
CSUMB has been working to reduce its budget deficit by increasing Student Faculty Ratio to its 2015 levels (28.6 SFR). With this, the university has also introduced its largest incoming first-year population in its 30-year history.
Environmental studies major Roxy Orozco is one of those first-years and was on the waitlist up until the weekend before the semester officially began. For her, the process was arduous from beginning to end.
“It honestly makes me feel stressed out and not that they don’t necessarily care about me, but it felt like I was put at the bottom of the list,” shared Orozco.
Orozco is a first-generation college student from Los Angeles who comes from a low-income household, so the prospect of commuting or finding off-campus housing was out of the question for her.
With the semester quickly approaching and the odds seeming bleak, she decided to sign a lease for a place off campus where she would have had to pay more.
Fortunately, she was later supplied with on-campus housing and able to leave her lease on the off-campus unit. Yet, if Orozco couldn’t find a place or wasn’t able to be accommodated at the university, she would have had to defer for the semester, putting a halt to starting her education at her dream school.
“I picked Monterey because I feel like I can connect here. There’s just a feeling to it,” shared Orozco. “Everybody’s very welcoming and it’s one of the best Cal States for my major.”
“Student Housing and Residential Life is providing information about off-campus housing options to those who have not yet received an assignment, those who are on the waitlist, and those who have not yet applied for housing,” shared the Office of Communications.