Living arrangements
Housing costs are included in the program fee and are based on double occupancy in furnished apartments with cooking facilities; students with special housing needs should contact the ACM office early in the application process. The costs for apartment rent, gas, electricity, and wireless internet are included in the program fee.
While locations may vary each semester, apartments are located in the city of Chicago, close to public transportation and a variety of amenities. The Chicago Program office is easily accessible via public transportation from the various student housing locations.
Students typically live in Hyde Park, Logan Square, or the Gold Coast (though neighborhoods may be subject to change based upon enrollment). Students from the Arts, Entrepreneurship, and Urban Studies academic tracks of the program may be housed in any of the apartment locations throughout the city.
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Hyde Park is located on the southeast side of Chicago and is within walking distance from Lake Michigan. It has beautiful housing stock, strong institutions and stores, and it is anchored by the University of Chicago. However, it is much more than a university community. The University of Chicago is an ambivalent presence, sometimes accused by neighboring communities of insulating and isolating Hyde Park while trying to control those neighboring communities. It is the city's most truly bi-cultural neighborhood, where black and white, rich and poor, live together – if not always in harmony, at least in dialogue.
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Logan Square, located on the near Northwest side, is a vibrant community at physical and social crossroads. Bisected by Milwaukee Avenue, one of Chicago's most interesting multi-ethnic thoroughfares, Logan Square retains the flavor of the original Scandinavian and Western European settlers while incorporating the influences of the Puerto Rican and Mexican communities to the south, and the Polish enclave to the North. Also running through Logan Square are Logan and Humboldt Boulevards, wide promenades lined by stately turn-of-the-century mansions that stand in sharp contrast to the low-income housing several blocks away. The relatively stable ethnic and economic mix, close proximity to cultural experiences, ranging from Salsa dancing to the avant-garde arts scene of Wicker Park, and the presence of many varied community organizations, make Logan Square an exciting place to come to understand the joys and tensions endemic to living in Chicago.
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The Gold Coast (or Near North Side) is a busy commercial and residential neighborhood with an active night-life, located just north of the heart of downtown Chicago. There are grocery and drug stores, restaurants and cafés located within a couple of blocks of the student apartments. Lake Michigan, the shoreline bike path, and the beach are just three blocks east, and the neighborhood of Lincoln Park is about a half mile north. The Gold Coast is an increasingly upscale, bustling neighborhood that contains many of the city’s top tourist sights and entertainment venues.
Video tours of the Chicago Program apartments