Students who are 20 years old or have completed 60 credit hours can now avoid the residence halls if they so choose.

The Kent State Board of Trustees changed the requirements for students living on campus at its meeting Wednesday at the College of Podiatric Medicine in Independence. The board decreased the number of credit hours from 64 to 60 and lowered the minimum age to live off campus from 21 to 20.

The policy changes will take effect spring 2014.

The board did not change the requirement that students taking nine or more credit hours to reside in the university’s residence halls and use the meal plan their first two academic years at Kent State.

Greg Jarvie, vice president of enrollment management and student affairs, said the policy affects about 250 students per year. He said the change makes it easier for students to live off campus.

“It’s just been on the books for a long long time,” Jarvie said of the policy. “We did a review and decided to just lower those two standards. We felt that this matched up more with university policy in regards to the student status of their second year.”

Jarvie said the policy will give them “a more lenient opportunity if they’d like to to live off campus.” The policy will still exempt those who are live at a parent or guardian’s house within a 50-mile radius of campus.

In the morning, the board met in executive session to discuss personnel matters. Richard Marsh, chair of the presidential search committee search, gave an update about the presidential search at the meeting.

“The search committee continues to work hard in achieving the best result for Kent State,” he said. “The diversity of views on the search committee has been very helpful to us. Those blended viewpoints have helped us through this process. The committee does not have a specific timeline to produce the best result for Kent State.”

Kent State President Lester Lefton reported on the university’s “See You @ College” program, an initiative to encourage high-school students, especially high-achieving, first generation, low income students, to prepare and plan for a college education.

“See You @ College” will be launched with a conference on the Kent Campus on Feb. 13, 2014.

The board also approved the other following resolutions:

Approval of the university’s six-year capital plan, which requests $86 million in state funds that will be used for facility projects and maintenance. The plan, an initiative set by Ohio Gov. John Kasich for university maintenance, research and funding for Ohio college campuses, includes the renovation of science buildings on Kent’s campus.

The official naming of the naming of the Lester A. Lefton Esplanade

The recognition of C. Owen Lovejoy, a member of the presidential search committee, as a distinguished professor of Human Evolutionary Studies.

Contact Madeleine Winer at [email protected].