Orange County Register reported on August 31st that Cal State Long Beach will buy five acres now occupied by Brooks College and turn the site into desperately needed student housing. Long Beach State is the second largest campus in the California State University system and is the third largest in terms of enrollment. Despite of that, CSULB is only able to house fewer than half the freshmen who arrive each fall. By fall 2009, the campus expects to be able to house 700 more students each year at the Brooks College site, after the private vocational college closes in summer 2009. Some 200 CSULB students already live in the dorms at Brooks College. While the university will honor the college's lease, which expires in 2009, as dorm rooms become available, university students will be allowed to move into them.
Adding the soon-to-be-closed campus's residence halls to Long Beach State would bring to a total of 2,700 campus housing beds available for students.
Brooks College is well-known for offering courses in fashion design, fashion merchandising and computer animation. They are have not been accepting new enrollees. Their lease will expire in 2009.
"We are not buying the entity called Brooks College, we are just buying the land and buildings," said Robyn Mack, associate vice president div of admin and finance for Long Beach State.
"We have a tremendous waiting list of students who want to live on campus," CSULB President F. King Alexander said. "We have to improve that opportunity for them.
That is good news to California residents who may have children planning to enroll in SCULB in the next few years. More than half of the new Cal State students come from southern California.
After 1.75 inches of rain, we experienced one of the most beautiful days ever! It is so rare that the air is so clean and clear in Los Angeles County. Up at the highest peak in the Long Beach area, Signal Hill was teeming with onlookers and photographers. You could see all of Los Angeles and Orange County. 