Student Housing Business is the voice of the student housing industry.
Issue link: https://studenthousingbusiness.epubxp.com/i/564824
VIE W FROM THE ACADEME JULY/AUGUST 2015 STUDENT HOUSING BUSINESS .COM 82 they rarely or never interact with faculty out- side the classroom. The numbers were pretty striking, so we knew that that was an impor- tant component of this program because we know that students are more successful if they interact with faculty. We also know that stu- dents are more involved with the university if they live on campus. Part of the second year program is that, if students live in with us the second year and take part in this program, there are certain things that you're required to do. Students have to take some classes in fnancial literacy, and they are teamed with a faculty member at about a one-to-20 ratio. The faculty member then meets with you on a regular basis, kind of as your mentor, and helps you with decisions about what you're going to do with your life, not necessarily associated with your major. We're not teaming all architecture students with all architecture professors; the whole intent was to mix it up so that students get a broad perspective because a lot of students, at that point, do not know what they want to do. Then, the second semester of their second year, they can design a program — it can be a study abroad or a service learn- ing project — and the students can apply for up to $2,000 to use towards that program. A lot of students are using it for study abroad, combining that with a service-learning proj- ect. That's a very brief summary of what the program is, but it involves interaction with the faculty and working at a cohort with 19 other students from all diferent backgrounds and majors to expose students to as much as they can that second year, knowing that that is when they really need to be thinking about what they're going to do with the rest of their lives. When you're in your frst year, you're just learning about yourself and what it's like to be at a university, and then your second year is more determining what you're going to do for the rest of your life. The program is geared towards your success once you leave the university. SHB: How would you describe the housing stock at Ohio State? Calhoun: We have a variety of housing, just in terms of condition. We have a lot of new housing, and a lot of renovated housing, but then we still have some housing that is not air-conditioned. Some of that is trying to be sure that we have access for students who are looking for less cost in housing. Those students will sometimes opt for a non-air-conditioned room so that they can save some money. We've got two- and four-person rooms, and again a lot of that is to be sure that students have options relative to cost and experience. All of our buildings have been renovated in some capacity, but maybe not completely. Some of our buildings may have new ceilings, foors and furniture, but maybe not all of the infra- structure, like plumbing and mechanical, is updated yet. In some buildings, mechanical and plumbing have all been replaced, but we have not upgraded all of the fnishes. We've not had the privilege of taking buildings ofine, so our renovations are typically things that can be done during a summer unless we're doing something like what we're doing in the North District. Then we took buildings ofine, but that meant for several years that we had to quad up certain buildings, which is obviously not our favorite thing to do in terms of stu- dent experience. A lot of our renovations and upgrades are done during summer, so we'll go in and upgrade all of the ceilings, and just that part will get done. Then, we might come back the next summer and take care of the fooring and fnishes. We've got a lot of 1960s buildings — that was a big boom — and then we have several 1920s buildings, which are wonderful and have wonderful character. You can see our stock relative to the years that they were built. SHB: How do you work with of-campus pro- viders? We've always heard very good things about OSU from the of-campus community. Calhoun: We have of-campus student ser- vices, which has been in existence for at least 10 years. There are not a whole lot of pro- grams like this around the country. We have great relationships with the landlords; there are probably fve or six that hold about 60 percent of the of-campus housing stock. We don't know every single landlord, but we have good relationships with a core group of them. We host lots of meetings and lunches to keep up the town-and-gown relationship. Recently, there's been a strong a concern about safety of-campus. We've lost a few students in fres of-campus that were tragic. We have lots of programs where we go of-campus and help landlords do smoke outs in their buildings to teach the students how to get out of a building if there's a fre. We've created strong long-term relationships with events like that over the course of the last 10 years. Our director of of- campus student services is a great liaison with the students; he walks the neighborhoods a lot and knows the students, and landlords. Most recently, when we frst started talking about bringing all of the second-year students on campus, there was a little bit of a panic from the of-campus landlords that they weren't going to have as many tenants, and that they were going to have to rent to non-students. We asked what we could do to help with some of that, and we're working with them. Something that we started last year is what we call our of-campus housing excellence program. We teamed with the Columbus Fire Department and other departments involved in city code. The program is sort of like the fve star pro- grams, but we have fve Buckeyes. We have landlords who have signed up to have us come in and look at their apartments. The landlords must agree that they are meeting basic city housing code and then our program allows landlords to get extra points. For example, say that the code says that you have to have a smoke detector in every apartment and in the hallways. In our plan, you might get extra points if you have them in every bedroom as well. So, the minimum is the building code, and then there are things that you can do to get extra points. Another example would be car- bon monoxide detectors; they're not required by code, but if you have them, you get extra points. The Columbus Fire Department walks with us through the apartments and conducts their standard safety inspection and they do their own form. Then, we post links to the Columbus Fire Department's results so that parents can go online, and look at the results of these apartments. It's mostly geared towards safety and security, so we're not getting into amenities. Our group goes out and inspects the properties for safety. Are there bushes that are over the top of windows? Are the locks good locks? Do they have window alarms? Then, the complexes are rated and it's posted on the website. It's been awesome; we've had some great success. I think we've done 1,700 visits this last year. We have also got it set up to where a student can just call and say, 'Hey, I'd like to have a home visit,' and it does not have to go through the landlord. SHB: Have you ever shared this program with other campuses? That seems like something that other universities might want to jump on. Calhoun: We've probably had 10 or 15 univer- sities come and look at our of-campus pro- gram. Rutgers University, in particular, invited us to their campus, and had us meet with the of-campus communities. They also came to visit us. SHB: What is the overall goal of student hous- ing at Ohio State? " We have great relationships with the landlords; there are probably fve or six that hold about 60 percent of the off-campus housing stock. We don't know every single landlord, but we have good relationships with a core group of them.