University of Warwick
Coventry
The Warwick Accommodation Thread (+Guide in Post#1)
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A review of sharing in Westwood for the accommodation guide:
------------------------------------
Every year at Warwick there are more first years than there are rooms on-campus. The vast majority get a room, although many have to live off-campus. A select few will be chosen, completely at random, to share a room in one of the Westwood halls of residence. This was a position I found myself in last year.
Understandably, you're going to be quite annoyed. Warwick was my firm choice, and as such I simply assumed I would get a room and everything would be fine. When I found out I would be sharing there were lots of questions running through my head and, to be honest, none of them were really answered until I turned up on arrivals weekend. The purpose of this thread is to describe the sharing process. I'll begin with the weeks before term begins, moving on to arrivals weekend and so on. I'll also tell you a bit about the Westwood accommodation and what it is like sharing.
By now, many of you will be jumping onto the phone, if you haven't already, to Warwick accommodation demanding that you get a room to yourself or asking why you have been put in this situation. In the case of the former, you will simply be given an ultimatum; either except the sharing offer or live off-campus. Trust me, if you're worried that sharing will influence how you settle in to university it will not be anywhere near as detrimental as living off-campus. You're just going to have to accept it and make the best of a bad situation. In the case of the latter, they will give you a vague description of the process and leave you with quite a few unanswered questions still.
On arrival, you follow the arrival instructions given to you. During the course of this you will find out which room you will be staying in (for my year we had to go to Café Westwood to discover this). You may already know this from checking your rent statement in the my.data part of my.warwick, under the finances section. You will be assigned a room in one of the eight Westwood halls; Bericote, Compton, Dunsmere, Emscote, Gosford, Hampton, Knightscote or Loxley. Your room number will be a letter followed by a three digit number; the letter corresponding to the hall, the first digit to the floor you are on, and the remaining two digits to your room number. I was in E010, in other words room 10 on the ground floor of Emscote.
Upon arrival you will meet your resident tutor. You will be given your key and shown to your new room. Note that there will be two sets of keys to your room, one for each of you. One set has the door key, a cupboard key, and a postbox key. The other set just has the door key on it. It does not matter which set you receive; they are given randomly.
Your room will have two beds (with bedding), a bedside table, a wardrobe, a desk, a swivel chair, a chest of drawers, a lamp, and a sink. All of the rooms allocated for sharing have additional network ports for connecting to the internet (no wireless in Warwick accommodation, I'm afraid, so you need to bring a CAT 5 patch lead) and additional sockets for electrical appliances. The only annoying thing will be the lack of storage and desk space. There is additional storage space in several trunk rooms in each of the halls.
Your room mate may or may not be there on your arrival. If you want to ascertain this fact you'd be best off asking the resident tutor if your room mate has picked up their keys yet when you collect yours. Prior to this point, there is no (official) way of finding out who your room mate is going to be. You may be able to find them on TSR or Facebook but I don't know of anyone who was successful in this endeavour. The resident tutors (the people responsible for looking after your halls and your general well-being) will try their hardest to match you with someone with similar interests to yourself. In other words, you will be sharing with someone either on your course or a course very similar to your own. For instance, I study mathematics and was matched with someone studying MORSE. They may not arrive on the same day as you, either; arrival is staggered depending upon your last name. They may not even arrive at all, as happened to one of my friends. They may have chosen not to come to university after all. The only other thing you can assume about your room mate is that you will be the same gender.
I would advise that you spend time with your room mate. Go out to the freshers events with them. Do your first Tesco run with them. Get to know them; you could well be spending quite a bit of time with them. Make sure, of course, that you make friends with the others in your hall, as well. The first night could well be quite strange but you will get used to it. There are many universities abroad which have this kind of set up for accommodation as standard. Who knows, you may end up quite liking sharing, as I did.
When a room becomes available, one of you will be moved out and the other will remain in the room that you were sharing. You both get a say in who moves out. If one of you expresses a preference either way they will usually honour it. If neither of you expresses a preference, and a room becomes available, they will select one of you at random to move out. A problem arises if both of you express the same preference. In this case they are usually fairly compromising and will find the best solution for all concerned.
If you're really struggling in the situation then, after about a week of being at Warwick, you should get on to Warwick accommodation and start to make a fuss. They will have a number of rooms empty as students will simply have not turned up or will have dropped out and, as a sharer, you guys will get priority to fill them. Now, it is literally a waiting game. You will have to wait until rooms become available. When they do, Warwick Accommodation will contact one of you and tell you that you are going to be moving out. Be warned. Typically, the person who makes a fuss saying they don't want to share will be the one who gets moved. If you want to stay in Westwood, making a fuss may not be quite so good an idea. Of course, some years there are a lot of sharers. There was for my year certainly (it may be different for you guys with a brand new hall of residence having just been opened). If this is the case, you could end up sharing for a lot longer. The situation I found myself in was spending the entirety of the first term, and the first couple of weeks of the second term, sharing. If you haven't been contacted by the time the first term is over, you almost certainly will be contacted over the winter break making an offer to either your room mate or yourself for accommodation. Warwick Accommodation do not like you to stay sharing for a long period of time, stating that each student needs a study space (chair and desk etc) of their own. I think sharing for the first term is pretty much the longest amount of time you will ever have to share for. Rooms are always free after the winter break because many of the erasmus students, who only stay for a term, return home (they usually outnumber the sharers).
You may be concerned that, with the extra people sharing in Westwood, the facilities available will be put under strain. This is not the case at all. I can only recall a couple of occasions where I had to wait for the shower, and there are plenty of toilets on each floor. I'll take the opportunity now to explain the facilities available on the Westwood campus. It is unlikely that you visited it on an open day because it is about a 10/15 minute walk away from the main campus. There are two different types of hall all named in alphabetical order after villages in Warwickshire (Arden and Felden are missing from this list because they are used exclusively as conference accommodation).
BERICOTE, COMPTON, DUNSMERE AND EMSCOTE
These four are rectangular buildings. The ground floor has 11 rooms, a common room, a laundry room, and a kitchen. The first and second floors have 17 rooms and a kitchen each. All the floors have trunk rooms designed to offer additional storage (particularly useful for over-laden sharers). There is also a bike shed. They have had their kitchens completely refurbished over the summer of 2011.
GOSFORD, HAMPTON, KNIGHTSCOTE AND LOXLEY
These buildings are L-shaped. Honestly, I don't know as much about them. They have common rooms on the ground floor. I know that they don't have bike sheds but, instead, have bike racks outside (they are exposed to the elements). The kitchens, one on each floor, are shared by a few more people than in the other blocks (I believe it goes up to 24 to a kitchen).
Also on the Westwood campus, there is a post room, the Café Westwood (where Matthew Scott, who is high up in Warwick Accommodation and the resident tutor for Loxley, often organises a termly event for those living on the Westwood campus), music practice rooms, and state of the art sports facilities. You'll also be right next to the state of the art learning grid. This facility is open 24/7 and is excellent for last minute completion of assignments.
As I have mentioned, it is about a 10/15 minute walk to main campus. Many on TSR are put off by the distance but it really isn't that much of an issue. If you get a bike, you can cut the journey down to about 5 minutes. It is particularly quick to get to the mathematics institute and the other buildings in that area (statistics, computer science etc.) by cutting through Millburn House. If you are in the Life Sciences department, I would strongly advise having a bike because the journey from Westwood to Gibbet Hill is a long one without it.
I'll give you a quick summary of the pros and cons of sharing in Westwood:
PROS
CONS
I hope that gives you an idea of what to expect. Please don't hesitate to message me (2^Oscar) or post on this thread if you've got any further questions.
------------------------------------
Every year at Warwick there are more first years than there are rooms on-campus. The vast majority get a room, although many have to live off-campus. A select few will be chosen, completely at random, to share a room in one of the Westwood halls of residence. This was a position I found myself in last year.
Understandably, you're going to be quite annoyed. Warwick was my firm choice, and as such I simply assumed I would get a room and everything would be fine. When I found out I would be sharing there were lots of questions running through my head and, to be honest, none of them were really answered until I turned up on arrivals weekend. The purpose of this thread is to describe the sharing process. I'll begin with the weeks before term begins, moving on to arrivals weekend and so on. I'll also tell you a bit about the Westwood accommodation and what it is like sharing.
By now, many of you will be jumping onto the phone, if you haven't already, to Warwick accommodation demanding that you get a room to yourself or asking why you have been put in this situation. In the case of the former, you will simply be given an ultimatum; either except the sharing offer or live off-campus. Trust me, if you're worried that sharing will influence how you settle in to university it will not be anywhere near as detrimental as living off-campus. You're just going to have to accept it and make the best of a bad situation. In the case of the latter, they will give you a vague description of the process and leave you with quite a few unanswered questions still.
On arrival, you follow the arrival instructions given to you. During the course of this you will find out which room you will be staying in (for my year we had to go to Café Westwood to discover this). You may already know this from checking your rent statement in the my.data part of my.warwick, under the finances section. You will be assigned a room in one of the eight Westwood halls; Bericote, Compton, Dunsmere, Emscote, Gosford, Hampton, Knightscote or Loxley. Your room number will be a letter followed by a three digit number; the letter corresponding to the hall, the first digit to the floor you are on, and the remaining two digits to your room number. I was in E010, in other words room 10 on the ground floor of Emscote.
Upon arrival you will meet your resident tutor. You will be given your key and shown to your new room. Note that there will be two sets of keys to your room, one for each of you. One set has the door key, a cupboard key, and a postbox key. The other set just has the door key on it. It does not matter which set you receive; they are given randomly.
Your room will have two beds (with bedding), a bedside table, a wardrobe, a desk, a swivel chair, a chest of drawers, a lamp, and a sink. All of the rooms allocated for sharing have additional network ports for connecting to the internet (no wireless in Warwick accommodation, I'm afraid, so you need to bring a CAT 5 patch lead) and additional sockets for electrical appliances. The only annoying thing will be the lack of storage and desk space. There is additional storage space in several trunk rooms in each of the halls.
Your room mate may or may not be there on your arrival. If you want to ascertain this fact you'd be best off asking the resident tutor if your room mate has picked up their keys yet when you collect yours. Prior to this point, there is no (official) way of finding out who your room mate is going to be. You may be able to find them on TSR or Facebook but I don't know of anyone who was successful in this endeavour. The resident tutors (the people responsible for looking after your halls and your general well-being) will try their hardest to match you with someone with similar interests to yourself. In other words, you will be sharing with someone either on your course or a course very similar to your own. For instance, I study mathematics and was matched with someone studying MORSE. They may not arrive on the same day as you, either; arrival is staggered depending upon your last name. They may not even arrive at all, as happened to one of my friends. They may have chosen not to come to university after all. The only other thing you can assume about your room mate is that you will be the same gender.
I would advise that you spend time with your room mate. Go out to the freshers events with them. Do your first Tesco run with them. Get to know them; you could well be spending quite a bit of time with them. Make sure, of course, that you make friends with the others in your hall, as well. The first night could well be quite strange but you will get used to it. There are many universities abroad which have this kind of set up for accommodation as standard. Who knows, you may end up quite liking sharing, as I did.
When a room becomes available, one of you will be moved out and the other will remain in the room that you were sharing. You both get a say in who moves out. If one of you expresses a preference either way they will usually honour it. If neither of you expresses a preference, and a room becomes available, they will select one of you at random to move out. A problem arises if both of you express the same preference. In this case they are usually fairly compromising and will find the best solution for all concerned.
If you're really struggling in the situation then, after about a week of being at Warwick, you should get on to Warwick accommodation and start to make a fuss. They will have a number of rooms empty as students will simply have not turned up or will have dropped out and, as a sharer, you guys will get priority to fill them. Now, it is literally a waiting game. You will have to wait until rooms become available. When they do, Warwick Accommodation will contact one of you and tell you that you are going to be moving out. Be warned. Typically, the person who makes a fuss saying they don't want to share will be the one who gets moved. If you want to stay in Westwood, making a fuss may not be quite so good an idea. Of course, some years there are a lot of sharers. There was for my year certainly (it may be different for you guys with a brand new hall of residence having just been opened). If this is the case, you could end up sharing for a lot longer. The situation I found myself in was spending the entirety of the first term, and the first couple of weeks of the second term, sharing. If you haven't been contacted by the time the first term is over, you almost certainly will be contacted over the winter break making an offer to either your room mate or yourself for accommodation. Warwick Accommodation do not like you to stay sharing for a long period of time, stating that each student needs a study space (chair and desk etc) of their own. I think sharing for the first term is pretty much the longest amount of time you will ever have to share for. Rooms are always free after the winter break because many of the erasmus students, who only stay for a term, return home (they usually outnumber the sharers).
You may be concerned that, with the extra people sharing in Westwood, the facilities available will be put under strain. This is not the case at all. I can only recall a couple of occasions where I had to wait for the shower, and there are plenty of toilets on each floor. I'll take the opportunity now to explain the facilities available on the Westwood campus. It is unlikely that you visited it on an open day because it is about a 10/15 minute walk away from the main campus. There are two different types of hall all named in alphabetical order after villages in Warwickshire (Arden and Felden are missing from this list because they are used exclusively as conference accommodation).
BERICOTE, COMPTON, DUNSMERE AND EMSCOTE
These four are rectangular buildings. The ground floor has 11 rooms, a common room, a laundry room, and a kitchen. The first and second floors have 17 rooms and a kitchen each. All the floors have trunk rooms designed to offer additional storage (particularly useful for over-laden sharers). There is also a bike shed. They have had their kitchens completely refurbished over the summer of 2011.
GOSFORD, HAMPTON, KNIGHTSCOTE AND LOXLEY
These buildings are L-shaped. Honestly, I don't know as much about them. They have common rooms on the ground floor. I know that they don't have bike sheds but, instead, have bike racks outside (they are exposed to the elements). The kitchens, one on each floor, are shared by a few more people than in the other blocks (I believe it goes up to 24 to a kitchen).
Also on the Westwood campus, there is a post room, the Café Westwood (where Matthew Scott, who is high up in Warwick Accommodation and the resident tutor for Loxley, often organises a termly event for those living on the Westwood campus), music practice rooms, and state of the art sports facilities. You'll also be right next to the state of the art learning grid. This facility is open 24/7 and is excellent for last minute completion of assignments.
As I have mentioned, it is about a 10/15 minute walk to main campus. Many on TSR are put off by the distance but it really isn't that much of an issue. If you get a bike, you can cut the journey down to about 5 minutes. It is particularly quick to get to the mathematics institute and the other buildings in that area (statistics, computer science etc.) by cutting through Millburn House. If you are in the Life Sciences department, I would strongly advise having a bike because the journey from Westwood to Gibbet Hill is a long one without it.
I'll give you a quick summary of the pros and cons of sharing in Westwood:
PROS
•
You only pay half rent for the duration of the share.
•
You get to know someone immediately which can help with settling in.
•
There will be more people in your halls which makes everything more lively during the
freshers events.
•
The rooms in the Westwood halls are the largest on campus.
•
Laundry rooms in your block (seriously, this is so good).
•
Loads of facilities on your doorstep used pretty much exclusively by other people in
Westwood.
CONS
•
Lack of storage space.
•
Lack of work space.
•
A general lack of space; personal and physical.
•
Living in such close quarters with a stranger.
I hope that gives you an idea of what to expect. Please don't hesitate to message me (2^Oscar) or post on this thread if you've got any further questions.
University of Warwick
Coventry
Original post by 2^Oscar
A review of sharing in Westwood for the accommodation guide:
FANTASTIC!!!
I've added it to the front of this thread
It will be really useful for new students over the coming week
Anybody staying at Study Inn?...
Should we have received info, either by email or text, on which accommodation we're in by now? I thought it would come in mid to late september but apparently some have been told already.
Original post by MC armani
Should we have received info, either by email or text, on which accommodation we're in by now? I thought it would come in mid to late september but apparently some have been told already.
Offers last year came in 8th Sept, or around then. The people who have received offers are postgraduates.
Original post by 2^Oscar
Good review, I was sharing in Hampton last year for the first 3 weeks, before I got my own room on the same corridor as someone didn't turn up. I actually found out who my room mate was before I arrived from finding out my room number on the student finance page then looking on one of the facebook groups
.A small correction - there is a bike shed at Hampton, it's just a separate shed rather than being part of the building, so bikes don't need to be left outside (not 100% sure about Gosford/Knightcote/Loxley though).
(edited 12 years ago)
Original post by 2^Oscar
GOSFORD, HAMPTON, KNIGHTSCOTE AND LOXLEY
These buildings are L-shaped. Honestly, I don't know as much about them. They have common rooms on the ground floor. I know that they don't have bike sheds but, instead, have bike racks outside (they are exposed to the elements). The kitchens, one on each floor, are shared by a few more people than in the other blocks (I believe it goes up to 24 to a kitchen).
GOSFORD, HAMPTON, KNIGHTSCOTE AND LOXLEY
These buildings are L-shaped. Honestly, I don't know as much about them. They have common rooms on the ground floor. I know that they don't have bike sheds but, instead, have bike racks outside (they are exposed to the elements). The kitchens, one on each floor, are shared by a few more people than in the other blocks (I believe it goes up to 24 to a kitchen).
Original post by matt2k8
A small correction - there is a bike shed at Hampton, it's just a separate shed rather than being part of the building, so bikes don't need to be left outside (not 100% sure about Gosford/Knightcote/Loxley though).
A small correction - there is a bike shed at Hampton, it's just a separate shed rather than being part of the building, so bikes don't need to be left outside (not 100% sure about Gosford/Knightcote/Loxley though).
There's an bike shed outside Knightcote - this building http://g.co/maps/zf7v
I think Loxley doesn't have a bike shed though, because someone I know lived there and had a bike so they gave him the keys to Knightcote's bike shed.
Original post by ttoby
There's an bike shed outside Knightcote - this building http://g.co/maps/zf7v
I think Loxley doesn't have a bike shed though, because someone I know lived there and had a bike so they gave him the keys to Knightcote's bike shed.
I think Loxley doesn't have a bike shed though, because someone I know lived there and had a bike so they gave him the keys to Knightcote's bike shed.
Looking at that area on street view brings back so many memories of being around that area every day for 9 months, and also made it sink in even more how I'll never live in Westwood again
Original post by matt2k8
Original post by matt2k8
Looking at that area on street view brings back so many memories of being around that area every day for 9 months, and also made it sink in even more how I'll never live in Westwood again
Yeah, same here.
Original post by matt2k8
Looking at that area on street view brings back so many memories of being around that area every day for 9 months, and also made it sink in even more how I'll never live in Westwood again
Not necessarily, I believe there are houses connected to some of the halls for finalists/post grads to move into
Original post by 2^Oscar
A review of sharing in Westwood for the accommodation guide:
Super best reply regarding Westwood sharing ever...
Hope I'm not ending up as one
Original post by cazzy-joe
Super best reply regarding Westwood sharing ever...
Hope I'm not ending up as one
Hope I'm not ending up as one
When did you end up switching course?Original post by matt2k8
As long as you are still on your original course, it should be fine.
PHEW. Fingers crossed then. Thanks for replying
Original post by TheTallOne When did you end up switching course?
When did you end up switching course?Nahh..I just got unofficial acceptance from chemistry department..they suggest that I wait for my accommodation first then request for transfer..
Hey! I've just found out I've got Cryfield for my accommodation, I'm quite please as it was my second choice but I was really hoping for en-suite.
Soooo, i was wondering what the shared bathrooms are like. Are they like separate cubicles for toilets and showers and a communal sink area or are they like bathrooms at home i.e. a room with a sink, toilet, bath and shower.?
Thanks
Soooo, i was wondering what the shared bathrooms are like. Are they like separate cubicles for toilets and showers and a communal sink area or are they like bathrooms at home i.e. a room with a sink, toilet, bath and shower.?
Thanks
Original post by Rabbit Hearted Gir
Are they like separate cubicles for toilets and showers and a communal sink area
Thanks
Thanks
Basically yeah. There are a few baths in there as well.
You also have a sink in your room.
Original post by bexter:)
ive just got and accommodation offer and went to sign but ive forgot my username and password for the accommodation. So i looked through my old emails and i found my username and then i reset my password and it still wont let me in so now im really confused. Ive tried contacting the accommodations office by phone but it won't go through so ive emailed them. How long do you think they'll take to respond ??
*seriously panicking*
*seriously panicking*
1) Do you have your towel? If not, get one.
2) Don't Panic.
3) It may take some time, as they're overloaded by people bitching about how they didn't get their offer and because there's a small bug that's preventing some people from accepting their offers because stuff timed out, but all in all, don't worry about it. You've got time.
Aww, i was hoping they'd be more like little bathrooms :P Oh well, it says it's between 6 on average, does that mean it is usually 6 or does it vary much? Like 6 at most or sometimes 4 or sometimes like 8? Thanks
Original post by powermanchu
there's a small bug that's preventing some people from accepting their offers because stuff timed out
I think I got hit by the bug. Tried logging out, but now the site keeps spitting out errors instead of letting me back in. -_- Should I bother contacting someone (not sure who...) or just try again tomorrow?
I still haven't heard. Has anyone received emails in the past hour or so?
Has anyone received emails in the past hour or so?Quick Reply
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