For the fifth year, the Student Housing and Residential Life office held its housing fair at Butler Plaza, giving students the opportunity to learn about living opportunities.
“The purpose of this event is to introduce or familiarize our students with the housing options on campus,” said Maria Honey, assistant director of marketing and communications for SHRL. “This is an opportunity to say, ‘We are here, come have a fun time and come learn about our housing options.’”
To students who live on campus, a housing fair may seem unnecessary, but some students found it helpful.
“I know most of my friends don’t know about housing,” human nutrition and foods senior Linh Nguyen said. “They may know about it, but they don’t the details: how it works or how much it costs.”
The fair was much more than trying to get students in the door, though.
“I expected a lot people just trying to get me to join housing,” human development and family studies senior Hannah Henry said.
In fact, only three booths for actual residential halls appeared at the fair: one for Cambridge Oaks, one for Cullen Oaks and one for all seven on-campus options. The rest of the tables and booths were reserved for on-campus resources.
“In addition (to housing), we want to provide information that is useful and beneficial to the residents,” Honey said. “We want to make sure that there are resources for them here as residents.”
Amenities like parking, the dental office, health center, Zip Car, maintenance and more were handing out food and prizes, all while informing potential residents on who they are and what they do for students.
“They have a lot of services I didn’t know about,” Nguyen said. “I just thought you live on campus and everything else you have to handle by yourself. (This is) really good.”
The housing fair’s history has deeper roots than just trying to get students to live on campus: it’s a major part of president Renu Khator’s initiative to make UH a more reputable school.
“We started this during a time where the University was going through a lot of transition and the University had this goal of becoming a more residential campus,” Honey said. “It’s part of Dr. Khator’s strategic plan of making the university tier one, and one of those initiatives that had to grow was on-campus housing.”
Students who couldn’t visit the housing fair but still want more information can visit the SHRL website.
“I think it’s a great way to get people involved,” Henry said. “You get people to know at least what is on campus, and at the very least, you could help a friend who may need housing.”
