By Andrew Skerritt
(Source: Famunews.com)
The first vehicles arrived on Monday, August 19. The vans, SUVs and station wagons began pulling up with members of the Florida A&M University Class of 2028. With hand trucks and storage bins, fathers and mothers helped their sons and daughters move into FAMU Towers South.
On Tuesday, Towers North. By Wednesday upper classmen were moving into Samson & Young and Polkinghorne Village.
“Moving in went very well. We collaborated with faculty, staff and students and organizations to make move in a success,” said Vice President for Student Affairs William E. Hudson, Jr., Ph.D. “Student housing is at approximately 95 percent capacity, but we still have others moving in and we are making adjustments for cancellations.”
FAMU has on-campus housing to accommodate just shy of 2,700 students, said Herbert Johnson, interim director Office of University Housing.
“This is an exciting time of year. I always say happy new year to the staff because we have about 50 percent of our on-campus students new to housing, about 50 percent of our student staff are new employees, and for all of us, it is sort of a fresh start,” Johnson said. “This is a time to continue the good work and implement strategies developed from lessons learned of the previous year.”
Johnson said nearly 1,400 newly admitted students are registered for classes and set to reside in on-campus housing.
“New students living on campus is vital to assisting them in their collegiate transition and setting a strong and stable foundation for the remainder of their college careers,” Johnson said.
“All of our students will have an opportunity to enjoy the benefits of upgraded amenities and infrastructures in our residential facilities.”
“We have phased in large skill projects such as roof and window replacements, HVAC upgrades, and parking lot refurbishing in Rattler Pointe buildings where necessary and are currently working to bring the FAMU networking system online there,” Johnson added.
This time next fall, students will have another housing option. The University is constructing a new 700-bed residence just north of FAMU Towers that will open August 2025.
“For new and returning students alike, Phase 2 of our Towers project provides the University the opportunity to house even more students, and we will be able to provide over 3,400 beds,” Johnson said.
Change in Policy
Since the pandemic, FAMU has seen an increase in the demand for on-campus housing, with upper classmen seeking less expensive University accommodations.
This year, at the recommendation of Chief Operational Officer Donald Palm, Ph.D., the University required students to register for classes before they could reserve housing.
“We linked housing with registration to make sure the students who are residing in housing are registered for the fall. So part of the process and a change in culture is to ensure registration and so it worked to where we increased our student enrollment by date of by 25 to 30 percent because they had to register prior to being assigned to housing,” Hudson said.
“It made a world of a difference in making sure that we have the accommodations for the students and that they had their room assignments early,” Hudson added. “We communicated throughout the entire process through The Daily Venom, our social media platforms and via emails from housing to students. We over communicated.”
