Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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USC's Totally NEW Off-Campus Housing Site 0 Searchable Off-Campus Housing Listings 0 Pictures & Maps 0 Email/Web Site Links 0 Roommate Listings 0 Furniture to buy/sell 0 Summer sublets to list for rent www.sa.sc.edu/offcampus ■ OFF-CAMPUS Continued from page 1 all those things. It’s really a one stop shop,” said Clay Bolton, associate director of student involvement and leadership with the Department of Student Life. “I got here last August, and one of my challenges was to beef up this area and do some more things, and I think we’ve done that this year,” Bolton said. 1 he office receives its funding from a combination of student fees and external revenue sources, Bolton said. He added, however, that the office has a relatively small budget. “We do an apartment fair ... where we invite (representatives of) properties and apartments onto campus. This year we had 34 or 35 properties come on to campus. We charge them a small fee to do that and make some money that way,” Bolton said. In addition to making sure they take as little money from the school budget as possible, Bolton said they always encourage students to give on-campus living a try. “We want students to take advantage of living on campus,” Bolton said. “We feel like there are so many more opportunities for you, development-wise, education wise, involvement-wise if you live on campus. I always try to stress that. But, if you choose to live outside of campus grounds, we think this is your best alternative for finding a place to live.” Bolton also made a point of mentioning that certain students will stay off-campus regardless, and that the Off-Campus Housing Office is there to help. “If you’ve lived on campus for your first, second and even third year, you feel like you’ve done the campus thing and would like to have a different experience. This makes that possible. This makes it easier to go do that,” Bolton said. The Off-Campus Housing Office, besides just helping students find a place to live off campus, also provides guidance to students living off campus through a pamphlet about their Good Neighbor Program. “The Good Neighbor Program just gives you some basic guidelines in terms of good practices for living off campus,” Bolton said. In the future, the office plans to expand its activities even further by starting a student organization for people who live off campus. “A new guy coming to campus who is going to be a graduate assistant here is named John Rensink. He started Ohio States student led off-campus organization,” Bolton said. “I’m hoping he’s going to be able, during the course of this year, help us start a student-led initiative. It would be a student organization that would try to help students understand the importance of being good citizens and being an equal partner in the community.” Comments on this story? E-mail %amecocknews@gwm.sc. edu “We feel like there are so many more opportunities for you, development-wise, education-wise, involvement-wise if you live on campus CLAY BOLTON ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR OF STUDENT INVOLVEMENT AND LEADERSHIP Students receive a 10% discount* (except at Forest Or. location)