Django static files outside app not loading
<p>My static files will load fine if they are located inside the app but if they are located outside the app like in my project directory they will not load. I know this seems to be a question asked a million times but I can't see what to change with my code. This is Django 1.9</p>

<p><strong>folder structure</strong></p>

<pre><code>/site
├── manage.py
├── project
│   ├── __init__.py
│   ├── settings.py
│   ├── static
│   │   └── main
│   │       ├── css
│   │       ├── fonts
│   │       ├── img
│   │       ├── libs
│   │       └── scripts
│   ├── templates
│   ├── urls.py
│   └── wsgi.py
├── app1
├── app2
└── app3
</code></pre>

<p><strong>settings.py</strong></p>

<pre><code>INSTALLED_APPS = [
    'django.contrib.admin',
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.messages',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles',
    'rooms',
    'events',
    'activities',
] 

STATIC_URL = '/static/'
STATIC_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'staticfiles')
STATICFILES_DIR = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, "static")
</code></pre>

<p><strong>index.html</strong></p>

<pre><code>{% load staticfiles %}
    &lt;link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="{% static "main/css/bootstrap.css" %}"&gt;
    &lt;link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="{% static "main/libs/animate.min.css" %}"&gt;
</code></pre>