Geographical diversity and students’ housing satisfaction in South Africa

Abstract: This article examines how students’ geographical background influences their satisfaction with university hall of residence. The reason for this study is bore out of the fact that the diversity of geographical background is a major issue in post-apartheid South Africa as most students’ comes from diverse background. Moreover, few studies have been conducted to explore relationships between cultural differences and the housing satisfaction of university students in South Africa. The primary data for the study was collected through a structured questionnaire survey distributed to a sample of 60 occupants’ from a female hall of residence at the Doornfontein campuses of the University of Johannesburg. The findings from the survey revealed that 26.67% of the students reside in urban areas while 73.33% of the students reside in rural areas, township and informal settlement. Further findings revealed that the urban students were less satisfied with specific features in the hall of residence while student’s who reside in the rural area, ‘location’ and informal settlement were more satisfied. However a unified finding in the study revealed that students’ from different geographical background were satisfied with the neighbourhood facilities. Diversity of geographical classification is a major issue in many societies as no society is mono-ethnic. Hence there is a need to determine the influence of geographical diversity in students housing so that universities can better serve students’ needs