Student Housing and Dining

This is an archived copy of the 2021-2022 catalog. To access the most recent version of the catalog, please visit http://catalog.iastate.edu.

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Department of Residence (DOR)

Welcome to your Cyclone Home! The university provides housing for almost 10,000 students in university owned on-campus residence halls and apartments.

  • Single (non-family) student housing is available in all residence halls and the Frederiksen Court and University Village apartment communities.
  • Family housing is available to students and their partners, children, and other relatives in the Schilletter Village apartments.

While newly-admitted freshmen 18 and under are assigned to the halls, all halls and apartments have a diverse mix of freshmen, sophomores, juniors, seniors, and graduate students making on-campus housing a great place to live and learn. Visit http://housing.iastate.edu/ for details.

ISU Dining

With 26 locations, a fresh meal or snack is right around the corner! We offer flexible meal plans for students living both on and off-campus. Our dining centers serve a wide variety of fresh-made items and are a great place for a sit-down meal. Locations like our cafes, restaurants and markets are perfect for coffee breaks, meals and snacks when you’re on the go. Our culinary team is ready to serve you! 

If you’re living in Birch-Welch-Roberts, Barton-Lyon-Freeman, Linden, Maple, Willow, Larch, Geoffroy, Buchanan, Eaton, Martin, Helser or Friley Halls, you can choose any of the following plans! A quick explanation of each plan is below and you can learn even more on our website.

  • Cardinal and Cyclone Plans: These are anytime plans, you never have to worry about counting meals! Just pop into a dining center whenever you'd like. The convenience and flexibility of these plans are perfect for a busy student's lifestyle. We even added more dining dollars to our Cardinal plan for a total of $100 dining dollars per semester for all your snacks!
  • Gold Plan: This is a declining meal balance plan. You have 200 meals of dining center meals each semester you need to keep track of.
  • CyFlex: This is our hybrid plan and combines the functionality of the other two types of plans above.

Each plan also gives you a set number of Dining Dollars and Flex Meals. Plus, you have access to GET & Go meals.

  • Dining Dollars: These spend dollar-for-dollar and are intended for things like snacks and convenience items.
  • Flex Meals: Use these at any campus location when you want a full meal - they're perfect for restaurants and you can even use them to get a friend into a dining center.
  • GET & Go: These locations are on the east and west sides of campus (UDCC and Conversations). You'll get a hot entree, two sides and a drink. This service uses one of your dining center swipes and you can use these locations up to 10 times per week.  It doesn't use a Flex Meal or Dining Dollars.

Are you a Wallace, Wilson, Fredriksen, or SUV resident?  You can choose from the plans above or from the apartment plans that are located here

Questions about choosing a plan? Email us at dining@iastate.edu