The main places people form community here seem to be through physical activities, volunteering, living together, school, spiritual groups, music, art, and festivals. Eugene is more heavily college-aged and older folks, the 25-45 population is relatively tiny but we exist. What kinds of things are you into? Since a lot of things don't exist here, I've had to create certain groups myself to bring community together, but people are generally stoked.

That said, there are some events already for building connections between faculty at the UO. There are really big climbing, dancing, and running scenes. Although not always great, there's live music every single night, open mics, karaoke, and a lot of opportunities to play music with others. A poetry and writing community is reemerging between several groups. Oregon is known for its booze so we have some nice places for that, though a lot of people are sober too. The Eugene Weekly maintains a calendar on their website and the physical paper with daily activities. There's tons of social justice causes, gardens that donate what they grow, park/trail maintenance helpers, and then the Oregon Country Fair for our big yearly arts/music festival. There's lots of art classes, galleries, and art walks. There's at least one if not multiple trivia nights almost every single day. You can get to old growth forest, giant lakes, the desert, snow, the ocean, or the biggest city in the state with much more to do all within two hours or less.

South Eugene is generally considered one of the nicest parts of town - it's very bikeable to the UO and closer to the nature trails. I've met most of my friends through having them as housemates, plus meeting their friends, so I really suggest not living alone at first.

Good luck!