\u201cI love the intentionality of this role of being able to kind of create something from scratch,\u201d she told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest. \u201cKind of get in there, get to really talk to the students, see what\u2019s missing, what they need and kind of working alongside them and alongside leadership and the rest of the team here to really develop those for students.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
However, there are\u00a0a number of\u00a0students that were unaware of the office\u2019s existence.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Earles and fellow English junior Sarah Oliver, who have commuted to the St. Petersburg campus since fall 2025, had never heard of the Commuter and Off-Campus Housing office.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Both said that they\u00a0didn\u2019t\u00a0feel they had much support as commuter students and would like to see some kind of marketing or newsletter that is specifically sent to commuter students\u2019 emails so that they are aware of the resources they have.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ayres told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest\u00a0that spreading awareness about the resources her office offers has been one of the biggest hurdles\u00a0they\u2019ve\u00a0faced this school year, and they have\u00a0been looking for ways to achieve effective outreach.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of the most helpful solutions so far is speaking at campus orientations, which Ayres did for the first time during\u00a0winter orientations. She said that this will ensure that incoming commuter students, at least, will be aware of the organization and know where to look in times of need.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Outside of this, the office markets their services through social media,\u00a0flyers\u00a0and events.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of their most recent events was a campus flea market that took place on April 8 in the University Student Center (USC).\u00a0<\/p>\n
This event drew crowds of students who were able to\u00a0purchase\u00a0a variety of items from their peers, who were vendors at the event.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Many of the vendors and attendees were students living on campus, whom\u00a0Ayres aims to encourage to spread more awareness about the office and be a resource if those students choose to move off campus in future semesters.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She said that all students are welcome to make appointments with her.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Kira Gibson, an English and digital communications and multimedia journalism double major, said that despite not ever being a commuter student herself, she sees the benefits that the flea market and similar events can have for commuters.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve heard a lot that commuters tend to feel very disconnected from campus and the students who live on campus,\u201d she told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest. \u201cThis is an opportunity for both of them to kind of\u2026mingle and talk to one another, so [it] helps foster community.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Marine biology senior Luis Ramos, who has been commuting to the St. Petersburg campus often for about two years and attended the flea market event, echoed this\u00a0sentiment\u00a0and said that events like the flea market are\u00a0a great way\u00a0to expose commuter students to campus-based and local groups.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201c[It] is pretty hard to manage time to explore day to day when I\u2019m commuting because I do have to make it back to the Tampa side,\u00a0where I live most of the time for work or whatever else,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, I don\u2019t always get to really interact with everything locally on the St. Pete side.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Though he has had little interaction with the Commuter and Off-Campus Housing office since its\u00a0inception, he believes that the programming they put on will be helpful for other students.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the future, he said that he would like to see \u201cany events that bring people together\u2026to talk about how commuting has impacted [students,]\u201d Ramos said. \u201cBecause it might not be the same for everybody.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
He also said that the Commuter and Off-Campus Housing office could do research into students\u2019 schedules and consider this when event planning.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ayres has already implemented this idea into her programming after looking into the times at which commuters are most often in class.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe do also try to rotate when we do our events to make sure that\u2026all students have an opportunity to attend our event at one point or another,\u201d she told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The office has also hosted several \u201cgrab-and-go\u201d events for holidays and\u00a0important events\u00a0so that commuter students can still\u00a0participate\u00a0in the festivities even if they are leaving campus.\u00a0<\/p>\n
While these events have the benefit of involving students in campus life, they do not extend their reach to everyone, said Erica Lauer Vose \u2014 a marine biology major who has been commuting to USF St. Petersburg since 2022.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As an older student, she found that many of the events hosted by the Commuter and Off-Campus Housing office are \u201cnot quite as relevant\u201d to her.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe age is not the defining characteristic,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s\u00a0just,\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0interested in different things than [younger students] are. So, I\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0know that\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0a particularly relevant demographic for this.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
While older students do not make up\u00a0a majority of\u00a0the population of USF St. Petersburg, they are often present on campus for class and research opportunities.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Vose told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest\u00a0that some of the ways she and other older commuter students could\u00a0benefit\u00a0from Commuter and Off-Campus Housing\u2019s resources is through carpooling services and a secure location where commuter students can leave their stuff while on campus.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want to leave my computer and everything if I go to the bathroom [when] I\u2019m sitting in the library,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m going to pack everything up and haul it with me and I feel like I spend a lot of time just like trekking my things around, especially this year.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Storage for commuter students could become a possibility\u00a0in the near future\u00a0through the\u00a0proposed commuter lounge<\/a>\u00a0that Ayres has been working to install.\u00a0<\/p>\n Suggestions like these can be made through the various surveys that the Commuter and Off-Campus Housing office sends to students and can be used by commuter students to advocate for themselves and create change on campus.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re here to kind of have those conversations with commuters,\u201d Ayres said. \u201cAny feedback that they give us [can be brought] back to leadership [and brought] back to whatever campus partners oversee those entities so we can try to find a good solution and compromise that works the best for everyone.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Written by: Julia Birdsall<\/a> on April 23, 2026.
Last revised by: Julia Ferrara<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Located in office 1707 in the Judy Genshaft Student Life Center, Kaylee Ayres is available to speak with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243236,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-243235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243235\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}