My name is Sofie and this is my second semester at SBCC studying photography.
I come from a city in Sweden called Malmö. I worked at a bank for about 6 years. I felt it was time for a change and I found Santa Barbara City College on the Internet. Everything I read about the school was positive. I do not think I read one bad review about SBCC.
I moved to Santa Barbara from Sweden in the beginning of August 2012. My friends and I moved in at the Villas late August/early September. The Villas is a great place to live as a student, especially if you are foreign like myself. We have all these different events, like going to the drive-in movie, open mic night, a taste of I.V., decorating cupcakes and pumpkin carving, where we can meet the other students that live here and the Community Assistants (CAs) that work here.
At first, I wasn't really sure if I wanted to live in Isla Vista (I.V.), since I had heard so much about it being a crazy party place with lots of crimes, but I have been shown the opposite.
It is so beautiful here. It is close to the beach and the views are amazing. Looking one way we see mountains and looking another way we see the ocean. It is very green here with lots of trees and grass fields. There are a lot of parties going on, but they keep them mainly on one street called Del Playa, which is not in the center of I.V. so you can get away from it if you want to.
In the center of Isla Vista, there is a Starbucks, The Habit (hamburgers), Freebirds (Mexican food), Subway, Silvergreens and a couple more eating places. There are also pubs, pizzerias, a sushi place, banks and markets where you can buy groceries -- pretty much the stores you need to survive. Not very far away, there is a K-Mart, Albertsons grocery store and Costco, where we can buy groceries in bulk to save some pennies, which we all know is worth everything as a student.
All in all, moving to Santa Barbara to go to City College has been one of the best adventures of my life. Stay tuned.