Editorial: Living off campus essential to growing up

Universities across the country are facing repercussions from the housing crunch. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, record numbers of returning students are requesting to live on campus in lieu of paying rising rent costs or dealing with the general hassles of living on their own.

But there may be a deeper issue at hand. An alarming number of students are having their parents help write their papers, pick their classes, and haggle grades with professors and teaching assistants. Judd Apatow movies continue to portray emotionally stunted “man-boys” incapable of handling responsibilities beyond those of a high schooler. Are students who choose to stay on campus throughout college just preserving their adolescence for a precious few more years?

The same factors that make people want to live off campus may also be scaring others into an extended stint in the dorms. Cooking for yourself, dealing with a landlord and locating a couch and bookshelves in Westwood’s painfully IKEA- and Target-free commercial area are all daunting tasks.

But part of college ““ a big part of college ““ is growing up. And college apartment living is a significant step in our adult lives. If you think it sounds scary now, imagine springing forth from UCLA, degree in hand, to live all by yourself for the very first time.

Apartment living in college is a good way to test out all the intricacies of living entirely alone: Roommates teach you how to cook or hang curtains, you don’t have to pay the cable bill all by yourself and you can still flee home in the summer without feeling like a complete bum.

Some universities cite rapidly rising rent costs as a deterrent to students living off campus. But at UCLA, apartment rates are more than comparable to dorm costs. And we aren’t alone in that regard: As the assistant vice president for campus residences at a State University of New York campus told the Chronicle of Higher Education, “Our prices have increased over the years, but demand has increased in spite of that.”

Apartments also offer numerous amenities that dorms can’t compete with. To name a few: full kitchens, air conditioning and heating, and the immeasurable satisfaction of not sharing your bathroom with 40 other people.

As recently as the early 1980s, UCLA only guaranteed housing for first-year students. It slowly crept up to second-years, and now housing is guaranteed for three years of a student’s college career.

Some schools are finding creative methods to make more space. Many, like UCLA, cram three students into double rooms. Other schools convert lounges and office space into dorm rooms. Many schools also try to offer an abridged apartment living situation by providing university-owned apartments, which are usually free of the hassles of buying furniture and finding a summer subletter.

UCLA should free up more space for incoming students and relieve the space crunch of high-rise triples by only guaranteeing on-campus housing to students for their first two years at UCLA. In addition to providing more space, this would force students to experience life outside of the cozy, secure world of the residence halls.

Living in an apartment is an important time period in every college student’s life. It provides an unparalleled opportunity to develop basic urban survival skills as well as wean young adults off the support of their parents and the university.

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