Housing almost ready for Columbia Basin College students

With Columbia Basin College’s new student housing almost finished, officials plan to start accepting applications next week.

Construction crews worked on drywall last week as they speed toward a Sept. 1 opening date for the $7 million, 126-bed project near 20th Avenue and Argent Road in Pasco.

The college’s housing website, housing.columbiabasin.edu, is now online to advertise the 44-unit, three-story student apartment building.

“There are a lot of interested students,” said Dan Quock, the college’s director of residence life. “We’re trying to make it as simple as possible to just move in with their belongings and be ready for school.”

The list of interested students include everyone from athletes to those who don’t want to commute to the Pasco campus.

The college pushed for the development after studies in 2007 and 2015 showed a demand for housing on campus.

The college joins eight other community colleges in the state in offering campus housing to students, including colleges in Yakima, Wenatchee and Moses Lake.

While the units in the building are being referred to as apartments, Quock said the living arrangements are closer to a traditional residence hall. The rooms fall into one of four groups — singles, doubles, triples or quadruples.

In each of the rooms, the students will rent a bed for 12 months. The rent ranges from a high of $950 a month for a single room to a low of $535 a month for a quadruple. Utilities are included.

Each room has a kitchen and a bathroom. They range in size from 240 square feet for singles to 550 square feet for quads.

The students need to be in good standing with the college.

Quock, a former resident director for the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, said he wants to create an academic community at the new dormitory. He is hoping to incorporate tutoring and social programs. Two of the rooms are reserved for resident advisers.

“They’ll have some guides that will be able to point them in the right direction if they have questions,” he said.

Plans call for the full project to include 375 units.

“I think this is a good sign that Columbia Basin College is going to be growing as an insitution,” Quock said. “I see this as a big stepping stone for us to become a larger school.”

For more information, call residence life at 509-542-4803 or email housing@columbiabasin.edu.

This story was originally published July 1, 2017 at 3:08 PM with the headline "Housing almost ready for Columbia Basin College students."