Students petition to keep Living Learning Communities
USC Residential Education cited “waning interest” as the reason for cancelation.
USC Residential Education is discontinuing its second-year Living Learning Communities in Century Apartments as of the 2024-25 school year, ResEd confirmed in an email to the Daily Trojan on June 4.
LLCs are “special interest” floors within USC Housing that aim to provide a space for “focusing on the identity as well as intersectionality.”
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The University will discontinue the second-year El Sol y La Luna, Somerville Place, and the Asian, Pacific Islander, Desi American Leaders Community LLCs this fall. El Sol y La Luna is dedicated to forming a close community among Latine students, Somerville is dedicated to “uplifting and exploring identities within African-American culture and the global diaspora,” and the APIDA Leaders Community is centered around “all students who have an interest in Asian Pacific American history, culture, and social and contemporary issues,” ResEd wrote on its website. The same LLCs will still be available to freshman students.
The second-year LLCs were created as a collaboration between USC Housing, ResEd, and Student Equity and Inclusion Programs, and began during the 2021-22 academic year in light of the coronavirus pandemic.
“The second year LLCs … [were] an opportunity for students who did not get to participate in these communities during their first-year [sic] at USC to have this experience as sophomores,” ResEd wrote.
ResEd cited “waning interest” as the main motivation for discontinuing the program, from both resident assistants and second-year students. Specifically, it had noticed a “large drop between those students who expressed interest in the second year LLCs and who ultimately ended up confirming their contracts after they were assigned.”
There are no plans to replace the program with any new programs for second-year students, but ResEd will open a Rainbow Floor for LGBTQIA+ freshmen. The first-year LLCs will continue to be offered, as well as the Century Apartments Rainbow Floor, which provides housing for sophomores, juniors and seniors.
Rachael Somers, who was a resident assistant for the second-year LLCs, however, said they faced many issues dealing with USC and ResEd. They also said that many people were interested in the LLCs, but experienced barriers to entry, such as essay requirements.
They said that in their experience with USC, it seemed ResEd was already set on discontinuing the program.
“My supervisor told me that … it was really all about the quantitative data rather than the qualitative,” Somers said. “If they have 20 spots for Somerville and not all 20 spots are being filled, [Somerville is] seen as a failure in the department, rather than focusing on the fact that [the] community was built for these 15 residents.”
Somers also said that some RAs didn’t demonstrate higher interest in the program because there was a lack of additional benefits for RAs who were managing special-interest housing. Somers themself served as an RA for all three second-year, culture-based special-interest housing programs and said there was a lack of transparency about the payment for the job.
“My supervisor at [Cardinal Gardens] at the time … called it a promotion. Which I think was funny, because I was not compensated additionally at all. There’s just really no transparency about how this process goes,” Somers said.
They also said ResEd’s general attitude contributed to the program’s decline.
“It seemed like they planned to fail rather than to grow this initiative,” Somers said. “They never asked anyone on the floor what they thought about the continuance of the program; they never even asked me as an RA.”
Arjun Bhargava, a rising senior majoring in art as well as gender and sexuality studies, shared Sonmer’s petition on their Instagram to help spread awareness.
“It’s really a trend that we’re seeing through universities where they will implement certain programs to accommodate people that suffer during COVID,” Bhargava said. “And those programs and resources will be really good and really effective. And then they will take that program away from students who were starting to become accustomed to that program.”
Both Somers and Bhargava said that application requirements were a major barrier to entry for people interested in participating in the second-year LLCs.
“It is weirdly competitive for a floor that is based on identities that people already have,” Bhargava said. “Is my skin not brown enough for you? Am I not Asian enough for you?”
Isabel Chavero, a rising senior majoring in political science who was part of El Sol y La Luna in her freshman year, said that being a part of an LLC provided a space for her to connect with her identity and find her people on campus.
“[Living Learning Communities] provide a really good sense of safety and stability,” said Chavero. “There are so many students who feel like they don’t have a community here at USC.”
Chavero said she did not apply for the second-year LLCs to give others the chance to experience the community she felt.
“I’m honestly really disappointed in USC,” she said.
A change.org petition created by Somers to “Reinstate the Diverse Living Learning Communities at Century Apartments” began in May. At the time of publication, the petition had 178 signatures.
Disclaimer: Arjun Bhagarva was an artist for the Daily Trojan in Spring 2024 but is no longer affiliated with the organization.
