This blog post is part of a series written by the Viterbi Student Ambassadors on our freshman dorm experiences. For more posts on this topic, check out USC Housing.
Whomever you ask, “What is the best dorm on campus?”, they are likely to respond with dorm where they lived their freshman year. Because wherever you end up, you will end up making friends and having fun. And while your dorm may be one of your first primary groups of friends you will quickly meet students all across campus through your classes and different clubs and student organizations that you choose to join.
That disclaimer aside, I was fortunate to live in best dorm ever….Birnkrant! Birnkrant had a great location right on McCarthy Quad (tons of university activities aimed just for freshmen or the entire undergrad population happen here including Conquest and Springfest! As Will mentioned it is loud but still a lot of fun to be right in the middle of all the excitement); next to EVK (one of two main dining halls for freshmen); was near Leavey Library if you ever wanted to study somewhere besides your room or in one of Birnkrant study lounges; and finally it was the closest to Trojan Grounds. Trojan Grounds, commonly referred to among students as TroGro, is a 24 hour convenience store/café which as a coffee fanatic was a great way to get a cup of coffee on my way to class or on those late nights when I happened to procrastinate writing that final term paper.
Besides the prime location, the people that I met made that first year here at USC truly memorable. My awesome RA (who I’m still friends with to this day!) was awesome and planned a lot of events for our floor to get to know each other. My hall, and most of the building for that matter maintained an open door policy, such that whenever we were jut hanging out in our room we would leave to door open. Some of my favorite interactions and conversations that year happened because of leaving the door open and meeting people. Everyone I met was nice and eager to meet everyone else and I am still close with many of my Birnkrant friends to this day including fellow VSAs Fro who lived down the hall and Matt who lived on the floor below me.
Birnkrant was a great place to live for me because it balanced being a dorm that was social but still studious, and it definitely created lasting memories and relationships! It was a great way to begin my freshman year and my four years here at USC!
