I looked the latest monthly rent report at apartmentlist (dot com).
Median rent for 1-bedroom and 2-bedroom apartments:
Bakersfield: $721, $936
Redding: $758, $1,019
Santa Maria: $1,353, $1,636
Santa Maria is cheap by California coastal standards – for example, it’s a bargain compared to San Luis Obispo or Santa Barbara. But even so, the housing there is probably not going to be competitively priced with inland cities like Bakersfield or Redding.
I would expect Sacramento City College to be a top pick for STEM in inland California. They send lots of transfers to UC Davis; in fact, SCC actually has a satellite campus at UC Davis now. So you can actually start taking lower-level classes on the Davis campus as an SCC student. However, Sacramento rents ($946, $1,200), while inexpensive relative to most California cities, are going to be higher than in Bakersfield.