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Cheat your way into a working Homeworld University

First thing you need is MasterController and Careers and I also have CareerDataTones - all available from NRaas Industries.

Next thing I do is grab a copy of the Student Union building from UL neighborhood and place it in the library. More on why later, but next is placing the UL rabbit hole rugs from MTS for the various majors as well as the Administration office inside the building as you see fit and enrolling your active sim for classes. I put Science, Business and Administration rabbit hole rugs on the main floor, Art upstairs with a couple of easels and Athletic outside. I recolor all the rugs to match where they're placed. I use the large lot up by the mansions in Sunset Valley after moving the equestrian center way up north.

Note that you must do the enrolling from the rabbit hole rug for Administration (not phone or computer) or your Sim will go off to regular UL university. You can use the university bucket test the mascot brings over (or buy one from buy mode) to trigger goodbye hugs, etc. but don't click the check mark after the test to enroll straight away because I suspect that will send you off to regular university. Instead just click the X and enroll and pick your major by clicking your Administrative rabbit hole rug you placed in your homeworld university. Pick a major and remember what it is was because you'll need to assign a professor and other students to the same major so your sim gets as full experience as possible and isn't attending all by themselves.

It's best to enroll on Saturday so you can spend Sunday wrapping up your affairs and saying goodbye to your friends (as you'll be busy studying soon and may not have time to socialize with them) plus it makes all the university timing work better. Your classes, lecture, activity day and finals will all fall on the expected days as well as your report card or graduation days. I try to enroll between Noon and 2pm on Saturday so that in between single terms there is time to get the report card before enrolling again.

To get the professor to lecture your class, locate an appropriate sim about town directly after enrolling and use NRaas MC - under Intermediate, assign Career/Choose Academic Career and Level/2 Professor so your major has a lecturer at the podium.

Now, to fill up the desks for student lectures, after you enroll in homeworld university, accept the first party invitation you get... say you'll attend. Likely you will get a party invite on Sunday. When I got to the party there was about half a dozen adults there and I used NRaas MC to check all their Status/Career and everybody was either unemployed or self-employed, so I simply used NRaas MC to change all their careers to Intermediate/Choose Academic Career with the same major as my active sim and they all showed up for classes and the lecture hall.

To get the student meet 'n greet orientation event, complete with student service tables w/freebies, etc. make your homeworld university in the student union building from the UL neighborhood. Just put a copy into your library and come back to the world in question and plop it down and edit it. I like to make the lecture hall a little smaller and tuck an administration office in there too for the admin/enrolling rabbit hole rug. I also add a basement so I get 3 floors of space for things, but it's totally not necessary. I remove the food table in favor of a coffeebar w/barista and some tables/chairs. I also add a soccer field and basketball court out back as well as a bonfire and parking lot.

When you're editing make sure not to mess with the areas that are transformed for the meet 'n greet. To see them, use cheatcode buydebug and locate the "event marker" which is hidden behind a bush to the right of the doors into the building. In build mode you can shift-click the event marker into "orientation layout" and back to "common layout" to make sure your edits and layouts are working with the meet 'n greet setup. If you build your university from scratch there is no way to get the student activity tables as they're not in the debug catalog. I have no idea why nobody has made it buyable yet, but I suspect because homeworld university is a tad complicated to set up and there just isn't a great demand for it.

Business students will automatically do their activity at the main library in town, which is nice.  If you go in live mode to UNI and grab a copy of that "group science park" lot, you can bring that back to your homeworld and sims will go mess with it.  I have no idea what it's purpose is to be honest with you but it looks nice up by the Science Lab, so I grabbed a copy of that too.

You can assign dorms in your homeworld, but they don't auto-populate with students because students at homeworld UNI are engaging in an "academic career" like a job, not a proper UNI student per the game.  Close is good enough though if you don't want to load up UL or send your sims to "rural farmland" UNI.

Not sure what the annex rabbit hole is for, but I make a basement and put it down there along with a dance studio and some industrial arts (sculpting, chemistry and invention) work stations. The Stadium/annex combination rug - not sure what that is for, haven't used it yet... If you know what it's for, let me know!

I think you have to assign the students and professor EACH term after enrolling as I think those assignments are per-term only. Or 2 terms if that is what you set everyone for... not sure as I haven't tested 2-term much because I've been switching majors after a short term to see what is what. Especially interested in seeing how each "activity day" is handled by the different majors. The business one is flawless tho, using the main town library for messing with the business plan... I do edit the front hall of the library to remove the furniture tho, to make room for the students descending on the place, as they crowd into the front hall and set up their business plan desks there.

I think if you change households, your active sim loses this academic career and you have to start over, but you can switch using NRaas "make active" cheat to switch to another family if you really want to. This may have been fixed in a recent update tho.  I haven't tested it yet.

I am no expert and I don't know much more than what I've written here. Hopefully it encourages one person who wants a homeworld university to give it a shot. It's pretty nice not to have to load up a separate world just to see some university stuff! I love it.

There is a NICE homeworld university for download (just google "sims 3 homeworld university") but I don't know if it spawns the student activity tables during meet 'n greet, so that's why I use the student union building instead. I even summon the professor so I can talk to him (triggered from the table) and I like to check out the other goodies on the table too, so for me it's worth it.

If anyone sees a buyable student services table, let me know via the contact link in the menu bar above - and any additional hints/tips much appreciated! That's all I've got so far and it's pretty fun, but always looking to perfect it!

For those that don't like to read a lot of explanations and just want the quickie guide, here you go:

  1. NRaas MC/Cheats/Careers/CareerDataTones
  2. Student Union Building
  3. UL Rabbit hole rugs
  4. Enroll on Admin rug on Saturday (after taking bucket test if you want goodbye hugs)
  5. Assign professor and students in the same major

See? Really not that bad, right? Give it a try!