Valley housing won’t take summer off
With the end of USU’s regular school year approaching, many students will be faced with the feat of looking for a new place to live. Some individuals will leave for the summer while others will stay in Cache Valley.
In any case, local housing agencies – both on and off campus – don’t get the benefit of a summer vacation, said Whitney Milligan, director of Housing and Residence Life.
Because so few students enroll in summer courses, the Housing Office sees the number of on-campus residents decrease to almost 10 percent of normal occupancy.
“Generally when summer is here, there are between 200 and 300 students still living on campus,” Milligan said. “During the year when they’re full, we have 2,800 students living in housing.”
Still, just because many students leave Logan for the summer, Milligan said, that doesn’t mean the residence halls and dormitories go empty for months at a time. Much of campus housing is used for conferences for basketball camps, football camps, cheerleading camps and other youth groups.
“They’re mostly high school-age kids that come during the summer,” Milligan said. “They’re here for a couple of days and then they leave, then other groups come in. It’s really hectic and busy on the main campus, so we migrate all the summer students to the Student Living Center to keep them away from the madness.”
Milligan said the Housing Office has found most USU summer students who choose to live on campus prefer to be kept away from the high school student groups housed in the Towers and other residence halls.
“The main campus – especially central campus where Richards and Bullen and the towers are – gets crazy,” she said.
Keeping some housing open is a monetary decision, Milligan said. In the summer, there isn’t enough demand to keep all campus housing open. But the summer conferencing time of year brings in much revenue to the campus and Housing Office.
Space is filled by other types of tenants as well.
“We also have summer citizens – senior citizens that come up mainly from Arizona and places where it’s really hot,” Milligan said. “They kind of replace the student population during the summer.”
These “summer citizens” are housed in Snow Hall and Merrill Hall, Milligan said. But larger off-campus student housing complexes such as Old Farm also provide housing for this specific crowd of tenants.
The number of housing staff members decreases in correspondence to the number of students, Milligan said. Five housing resident assistants are hired during summer, a small comparison to the more than 60 RAs on staff during the regular school year.
James Shepard, a current RA and an undeclared freshman, said he plans to take the summer off and enjoy less responsibility.
“There are definitely less residents,” Shepard said. “The schedule is also different, but the benefits and responsibilities are fairly similar.”
By taking the summer off, Shepard won’t be faced with the challenges that come with this year’s summer citizens.
“Some of the summer citizens come every year to the extent that they are kind of a high-maintenance group of people,” Milligan said. “For example, in Snow Hall there’s a group of people that has come for several years. They begin to think it’s just their building and they’re kind of territorial. But in addition to the RAs that work over there, we hire a special summer citizen RA that works just with them.”
This special type of RA will help coordinate activities to pull that community together, Milligan said.
“They help make the experience positive, answer questions and address conflicts that occur,” she said. “It’s a lot more challenging to address a conflict there than with college kids.”
Shepard said he was glad to not be responsible for the summer citizens.
“I don’t think I’m cut out for taking care of the elderly as well as I am with handling youngsters,” Shepard said.
Private property renters and landlords face similar situations during the summer.
“I understand many students want to get away from the books for the summer,” said Bill Browne, a local individual who rents a few apartments to students. “I try to not put them into too much of an obligation with a contract. Usually I have them sign a semester-to-semester contract.
Browne said his system of operation has been beneficial for him.
“If they want to stay through the summer, that’s great,” he said. “But if I have a place open up, it’s usually pretty easy to fill with someone who only wants a place to stay for the summer. I’ve had students come to me and say they didn’t want to be close to the campus during the summer because they weren’t taking classes then. Sometimes they go back to on-campus housing when school starts in the fall. Other times they decide they like being a little further away and doing their own thing.”
It’s important to be flexible, both as a student and as a renter, Browne said.
“These are college kids,” Browne said. “They’re trying to wrap their heads around a million things. You have to understand that because most of us have been in that position at one time or another.”
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