University Village

Moving out and starting on your own is rough. It is even more rough when you are assigned random roommates, along with terrible housing, overpriced living, and below low quality rooms. Upon walking into UV you can already see the trash cluttered usually around the garbage cans but also all over the streets and lawns. A lot of the buildings look decent from the outside but are absolute rancid on the inside having, stained tiles (from past students or staff), moldy rooms, holes in the roofs, broken lights, broken chairs, just in general everything is barely holding together after being used for so many years. There is also no reason to be paying a 1000 dollars a month to be living in an apartment with 36 people total with 5 random roommate's. It forces you to make interdependent relationships and always have to deal with an extra curveball after a long day of classes. There are some nice things about UV like the pool (which is usually closed) or the hub that has pool and other games. However overall for my first year in college it has been an absolutely horrible living situation with drama always occurring and unnecessary fights breaking out. Overall UV is not worth your money and if you are looking into it I highly consider looking at normal apartments in the chico area or just renting with one or two other people as having five random people to live with is an absolute nightmare.

University Village was my freshman year dorm while attending CSUC. It was a nice transition from my parents' home to independent living.

Unlike most other incoming freshmen, I wanted more of an independent apartment-style living situation - and that's exactly what UV had offered. I was in a six-person "cluster" with my own bedroom and it was a decent setup with an updated, shared kitchen. My room was very spacious but was adjacent to a boiler that made a squeaking sound at all hours. There were a few instances where either my suite mates or the upstairs neighbors were noisy, but it really wasn't much different than a traditional dormitory.

My building's RA was excellent and did a superb job at getting to know us all. She'd host monthly gatherings and there were a few instances where'd I'd be the only one to show up, partially out of pity but also to take advantage of the free food. When you're a freshman, free food is gold.

I went to CSUC before there was WiFi, and my computer was connected to a wired DSL modem. It wasn't the best but it got the job done. There was an on-site computer lab which I took advantage of numerous times as it featured a printer and a more reliable internet connection. I never used the pool or the sports court. I remember that there were vacuums to rent from the community room as well.

A decent experience overall. My suite mates quite literally all went their separate ways after the school year ended, but it was as good as it could've been.