Coming to USC, it was really hard to decide in which dorm I wanted to live. I knew that I wanted balance in my life: somewhere that I could socialize with others but at the same time get work done whenever I needed to. Luckily, I got to live on the first floor of Pardee Tower.
Within Pardee, the floors alternate between all boy floors and girl floors where 40 people live on each. I found that this number was just the right amount to facilitate a community feeling between my floor-mates and made it really easy for all of us to meet and hang out. This was enhanced by people leaving their door open as long as they wanted friends to come in and out as they pleased. Also, it was really easy to go in between floors and hang out with other guys and girls: some of my closet friends today lived on the second and fifth floor of Pardee.
Each floor is setup in the same way. There are community bathrooms and laundry rooms on each, and the rooms are similar amongst every floor. Each one has 2 beds, a mini-fridge, a microwave, 2 desks, and lots of closet space. The beds could also be lofted to use the area underneath as extra storage space (I highly suggest doing this as it made the room a lot cleaner and more spacious). There’s also very large bulletin boards, one over each bed, for you to personalize. If you’d like to, you can also bring your own personal things for your entertainment such as TV and gaming systems. But even this isn’t necessarily a must since on the second floor there is a spacious lobby with TVs and couches, a pool table, a fooseball table, and study tables. It is this area that served as a haven for me during midterms, finals, and long nights of essay writing and homework-ing.
The location of the dorm was perfect too. It was right next to Marks Hall, Marks Tower, and Trojan Hall, and within short walking distance of New/North as well as Birnkrant so it made socializing with people outside of your dorm really easy. Pardee was also really close to TroGo, the main quad, Groundzero Cafe, EVK, and the two main libraries, Leavey and Doheny, all of which served as places that freshman would meet and hang out/do work.
All of these qualities about Pardee Tower really let me get the most out of my freshman experience at USC. I am very happy I got to live here and hope that, if you do, you will be as well!
glad you are enjoying Pardee tower… I had a friend who lived on the 3rd floor, we used to have good fun there. Facilities are good also