The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 44, No. 1 - 59

Supporting Aboriginal Student Success

to accommodation policies and practices.

Relevance: Location, Affordability,
and Suitability
Fifty-nine percent of the AHRP participants
relocated to Vancouver, BC, to attend postsecondary education institutions. When asked
how frequently they had moved since relocating, 36% said they had not moved, 29% had
moved once, 15% twice, and 18% had moved
more than three times. The top three factors
for AHRP respondents searching for housing
were affordability (94%), location (94%), and
the condition of the apartment (85%). Also
important were a safe location (79%), laundry
facilities (76%), and number of bedrooms
(69%). Female participants were more likely to
consider the safety of the neighborhood. The
factors of laundry and number of bedrooms
were considered more or less important depending on whether respondents had dependents and/or needed to share the cost of rent
to make it more affordable.
In the survey and sharing circles, many
AHRP participants commented that their decisions about living off campus were influenced
by the affordability of off-campus housing,
limited on-campus housing (particularly
family housing), and the need for multiple
rooms to accommodate their family needs. Accommodating physical needs is not only about
having a place to live that is safe and secure; it
is also about having the funding to pay for rent,
food, child care, and education costs. It was
evident from the AHRP survey and sharing
circles that financing and housing were closely
related, since without adequate funding, it
is difficult to secure accommodations on or
off campus. According to Maslow (1954), the
need to focus on basic needs, such as housing,

further impacts one's ability to focus on higher
order tasks, such as studying, which was
evident from the Aboriginal respondents in the
AHRP study. Table 1 indicates that 8% of the
AHRP survey participants were living in what
was designated as "other" accommodations,
which were often characterized by temporary
and unstable living situations (hostels, couch
surfing, hotels, sleeping in their car, or staying
in shelters). One student said they didn't have
enough funding from their First Nations
band (funding support for First Nations students through federal transfer payments to
their home communities) for both school and
housing, so they were spending the semester
couch surfing to stay in school.
Participants in the focus groups at each
site also shared similar stories of having to
make a choice between paying for rent or food
or school-many did not have funding for all
three. As one AHRP sharing circle participant explained, "If I can't afford to pay rent,
it means I must quit university and work."
For many participants, having secure and safe
housing was key for staying in school. Another
student shared that he lived in a temporary
situation because he could not afford to pay his
rent; he also knew of other students who were
impacted by a lack of funding:
In my first semester . . . I lived in a common
room, and I showered in the gym, and I was
here five days a week, and I slept on a couch
. . . we had had three students do that so far.
And all of them came into the situation where
either their band funding or student loan
ran out. They can't find a job, and they have
a month of classes, and there is no option.
And if you want to stay in, then you end up
sleeping on a couch. For me that was difficult
because it was my first semester, and I wasn't
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The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 44, No. 1

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 44, No. 1