Trying to outgrow a commuter-school image, Florida Atlantic University is considering a building boom that could come close to doubling the number of students living on campus within the next six years.
Originally an all-commuter campus only for juniors and seniors, 41-year-old FAU has tried recently to create more of a traditional college atmosphere, launching a football team and expanding student housing for the first time since 1969.
Student apartments and state-of-the-art suites were added within the last six years. But with waiting lists still as long as 300 students and enrollment expected to grow, the university has tentative plans to add more suites, apartments, and possibly fraternity and sorority housing.
The plans reflect rising interest in living on campus — and rising expectations of what campus housing should offer, says FAU Housing Director Rosanne Proite.
Plans sketch out enough space ultimately for almost 3,300 students on the Boca Raton campus, which now houses about 1,900. Trustees signed off last month on the first piece, a $22 million suite building with space for 600.
Expected to open in fall 2004, it would replace five older, smaller buildings. Three are so rundown they are used as offices or shuttered altogether, Proite said.
A team of architects, builders and FAU staffers found the older buildings would cost substantially more per resident to renovate than to replace, in part because the university would seek to halve the number of residents.
The older buildings are suites, 1960s-style: four two-person rooms around one bathroom, with only a single electrical outlet per student.
The new building will feature cable TV, high-speed Internet ports and no more than two double rooms to a bath, with some suites offering singles, according to Proite and documents submitted to the trustees.
“Our students don’t like living in close quarters today,” Proite explains. “We’re trying, now, to provide new residence halls that give them more personal space and a higher level of amenities.”
FAU isn’t alone. Nationwide, colleges and universities are building and rebuilding to keep up with students’ push for more space, privacy and creature comforts than an old-fashioned dorm provides.
Many students, after all, are growing up with more comforts. Between 1970 and 2000, the average U.S. family shrank from 3.58 members to 3.17, while the average new U.S. home grew from 1,520 square feet to 2,265, according to the Census Bureau. And while fewer students’ rooms had siblings in them, more had phones, televisions and computers, college housing officials note.
“Well, what do you think they expect or hope for or want when they come to a university?” says Gary Schwartzmueller, who runs the Association of College and University Housing Officers-International. “You can’t necessarily do all those things, but it certainly tells you what the expectations are going to be.”
While the trend results in roomier rooms and more modern accommodations, some college housing chiefs worry that the push for privacy comes at the cost of camaraderie, by making campus housing more like apartment dwelling than like dorm life.
That’s why FAU won’t build single rooms with their own bathrooms, despite increasing demand from students who don’t want roommates, Proite says.
“We still want our students to share some kind of space,” she said. “We very much believe that this is all part of the growing experience and learning about yourself and others.”
Instead, FAU tries to strike a balance in its newest residence hall, Indian River Towers, which opened last year. It features suites with single and two-person bedrooms arrayed around a shared living room and bathroom — and a lobby full of inviting sofas.
On a recent afternoon, the couches lured students such as freshman Bernard Bell.
He’s from Hollywood, but he thought he’d miss a good part of college if he spent less time on campus.
“If I lived at home, I couldn’t do half the things I do here, like interact with other students and chill,” he explained.
Many of Bell’s neighbors also come from within commuting distance, paying $3,100 to $5,500 per school year, depending on the size and age of the rooms, for the privilege of not living at home.
They say they live on campus in part for convenience, but also for a true sense of going away to college.
“I can stay up all night. There’s no rules — well, no mom-and-dad rules. If you want to go to 7-Eleven at 4 o’clock in the morning, you can,” said sophomore Dan Rosenberg of Aventura. “It’s basically the college experience I was looking for.”
Jennifer Peltz can be reached at or 561-243-6636.
