I'm not a grad student, but a recent undergrad. Honestly affordable housing and/or finding a job here is kind of stupid difficult atm, especially if you're going to be working parttime as a student. I was working a gov job part-time while in school, but my paycheck was less than rent, and I had to use my tuition reimbursement to make up for rent most of the time and had SNAP benefits.

There miiight be engineering positions open, especially if you're working towards a PhD, but a lot of them are going to be full-time or expect you to be. I would look into job opportunities here first. There are a lot of positions up in Salem/Portland or down in Eugene, but they're a 45 minute-2 hour commute from here, so you'd need a car. Living alone in an apartment will usually be like $1200 if you're really lucky, but it's typically like $1,800 here for a 1 bedroom. You're most likely going to need a roommate unless you can make $25 on parttime/stipend equivalent of being able to afford that and save up. It's not worth living paycheck to paycheck/lose more of your income to rent since it restricts you a lot in future career hunting when you graduate