On-Campus Student Housing – Unexpected Demand

primary goal was “to ensure a comprehensive and coordinated approach to campus development” that would “emphasize the importance of the university” in the broader community.29

With funding for construction in the 1980s, the academic buildings on campus formed an “academic core,” stretching east from Wickes Hall. The 1996 Master Plan called for limited additional building in the core, instead setting aside other campus land for future construction.

One such area was labeled Subcampus Zone C, which was deemed a potential research-and-technology park and where the Board of Control later located the Regional Educational Center and the Health & Human Services buildings. Other potential areas were Subcampus Zones A1 and B, near the Ryder Center and the athletic fields and the territory north of Campus Drive and east of Davis Road, which was set aside for “potential future use” and as an “insurance policy” against unexpected development.

The plan also called for the construction of elevated walkways along with more pathways and outdoor gathering places designed to connect campus buildings and make the grounds more inviting. The plan also projected the creation of additional parking spaces to serve an expected 8,000 students.

The 1996 Master Plan functioned as the university’s primary vision for growth during the construction boom of the 1990s and 2000s. In 2012, the board authorized a new campus plan.30

On-Campus Student Housing – Unexpected Demand

One aspect of the university’s growth that was not taken into full consideration in the 1996 Master Plan was the growth in student housing. “I don’t think we had all of that student housing in mind when we developed the master plan,” Hocquard recalled. As enrollment increased during the 1990s, Robert Maurovich, vice president for enrollment management, recommended that the university better accommodate its larger student population. In many ways, the resultant decision to construct more housing on campus was key to the rapid growth on campus. With more beds for students came the need for improved and expanded infrastructure, more dining options, expanded police and safety presence, a health care center, recreational facilities and a student center.31

In December 1995, the Board of Control began considering additional housing that would accommodate a modest total of 50 students near apartments on Pine Grove Lane. The board expressed two goals: to create a more on-campus “feel” in transforming the university from its origins as a commuter college into a residential campus, and as means to recruit students from a wider geographical range. A Pine Grove Apartments expansion opened for students in fall 1996 at a cost of just under $2 million, and a $600,000 expansion opened the following year.32

In early 1998, the university borrowed $23 million to fund more housing construction, and set aside from this $5.25 million for a science facility.33 The loan financed Living Center North, a 300-bed residence hall that opened for students in late 1999, and the first stages of the University Village apartment complex, which opened to student residents in 2000.34 The campus felt the impact of the new student residences immediately. One of the first res-

ident assistants at Living Center North, Kristi MacKenzie, called the building’s opening “a huge changing point in living on campus at SVSU. It showed this is a school that is going to meet the needs of its students.” Students increasingly chose to remain on campus instead of leaving for off-campus apartments after their first or second year as they typically had done before.35 In fact, by 2008 more than 70 percent of the freshman class was choosing to live on campus.

In July 2002, the Board of Control authorized the construction of even more student housing, via the addition of another unit to the University Village apartments and another wing to Living Center South. Students moved into these housing projects, the cost of which totaled a little more than $11 million, in late 2005.36

More than 70 percent of freshmen by 2008 opted to live on campus in new housing units, such as Living Center South. By 2013, SVSU could accommodate 2,700 residential students.