You’ve seen endowed buildings and scholarships. What about endowed beds?

Community colleges across California are searching for ways to help students who don’t have stable housing. And for at least one college, that now includes donations for room and board.

A 2019 survey of California community college students found that 16% of them were homeless and that 60% had experienced housing insecurity — that's the inability to pay rent, having to move frequently, or living in a place where personal safety is compromised. The lack of affordable housing can create a barrier to persistence and graduation.

To help, the state set aside money in 2021 to fund a grant program for colleges to build new dorms that will offer housing below market rate.

Sierra College is one of those grantees. The campus is located in Rocklin, just north of Sacramento. Thanks to an $80 million grant, Sierra College is now constructing a new dorm that will provide 350 beds beginning next fall. Students will pay approximately $450 dollars a month.

That price is “incredibly affordable in our region,” said Sonbol Aliabadi, executive director of the Sierra College Foundation. But, she added, “there are students who cannot even afford that.”

So in the vein of how universities endow schools and buildings, the Sierra College Foundation had an idea: create an Endow-A-Bed program. The goal, Aliabadi said, is to make 10 beds available for free. Seven of them have already been funded.

What's the need for inexpensive housing?

Aliabadi has been at Sierra College for nearly two decades. Over the years, she’s worked to help students in all manner of crises: Some were burdened with an emergency expense, others were experiencing homelessness.

Aliabadi recalled one student with a 4.0 GPA who was holding down two jobs while sleeping in his car. “All he wanted was to take a shower in the morning and be clean [when he went to work],” she said.

Faculty and custodians routinely reach out to Aliabadi and her team, asking for them to help students in need.

“I cannot tell you how often I get a call that someone's at our basic needs center, and they're desperate,” she said.

Sierra College set up an emergency fund where students can apply for up to $1,500 to cover anything from health care costs to childcare. The college also cut a deal with a nearby hotel to put up students for short periods of time until they can find permanent housing.

After the state funding for the new building came in, Aliabadi sat down with college president Willy Duncan to do some math. Together, they determined that a one-time donation of $250,000, “with the investment policy that we have in place,” could generate about $7,500 a year, in perpetuity — enough to cover one student’s room and board.

The college then began reaching out to local businesses and other community members to pitch in $250,000 each. A restaurateur who took English as a second language at Sierra College is among those who’ve signed up to endow a bed. Sutter Health and the Associated Students of Sierra College have also made a commitment.

Could endowed beds be a model for SoCal?

When complete, the new dorm will have other benefits too — it will be open year round to make sure current and former foster youth don’t have to worry about finding a place to stay during breaks and holidays.

Some community colleges in Southern California have also received state funding to build affordable student housing. But whether they’ll adopt Sierra College’s endowment model to provide free beds remains to be seen.

Aliabadi, a longtime member of the Network of California Community College Foundations, said colleagues at other campuses have reached out wanting to know details about how the Endow-A-Bed program works.

“If this would take off," she said, "I would be so thrilled."