Accommodation

>>SOPHIE: Welcome to Agnes Blackadder Hall. My name is Sophie, and I'm a fourth-year maths and computer science student.

Agnes Blackadder Hall is the largest single-roof hall, with approximately 550 students living under it.

Every single room is en suite with a mixture of catered and self-catered depending on what you like.

All catered students in Agnes Blackadder Hall have 19 meals a week - so that's breakfast, lunch and dinner through the weekdays, and breakfast and lunch on the weekend. This allows you to cook for yourself on the weekend at the evenings and allows you to start getting those skills to become self-catered later on if you choose.

Our dining room has lots of different options depending on your dietary requirements. Every single meal there is at least three different hot options with an option for vegetarians and vegans. You can also alternatively have a salad or soup as a light lunch if you decide.

ABH has lots of different social spaces to use, and one of these is the games room. It comes with a pool table, table tennis table, as well as a projector. This means that you can come down with your friends and watch a movie together or play pool and have fun at the weekends or after classes when you want some downtime. 

Our other main social space is Forbes Bar and Cafe. In the daytime, it's popularly used as a study space, and in the evening the whole committee
will often use it as a space to hold events.

Every hall has a hall committee, and the Agnes Blackadder and Powell Halls committee is no exception. They regularly host events inside the hall to cater to lots of different students, from things such as a free bar to also having arts and crafts evenings.

The IT suite is one of our most popular study spaces. This enables you to go into a quiet environment to study on your own or use the University computers where there is specific software available for your course. As well as this, there are bookable study spaces at the back for group projects where you can use the whiteboards to write down ideas and work together in a more formal environment.

Right next to the IT suite you'll find the wardennial office. The wardens team is made up of a group of PhD students headed up by a University member of staff. Moving into halls for the first time can be really daunting, and so the wardens
are there to help you every step of the way. If you want to pop in and have a chat and a coffee, their door is always open for you. The wardennial team often put on a range of well-being events which helps you to get to know them and be a part of our halls community. 

Our laundry room is open 24/7 with a range of washing machines and dryers that you can use at any point. There's so many in ABH that you can always find one.

Other study spaces include the third-floor study room. This enables you to go with friends in your corridor to work in a specified room so that you're not all crowding around the kitchen table.

The best part of Agnes Blackadder Hall is that every room comes with a double bed so you have plenty of space to chill out after a long day. Every room is
also, en suite, so means that you have the privacy of your own bathroom.

The kitchens also have everyone in your corridor together so you can start to socialise and get to know your neighbours quickly, no matter if you're catered or
self-catered. Each kitchen comes with a fridge-freezer, hob, oven and kettle for you to use at any point. You can often find me socialising with my neighbours in the kitchen.

With the hall committee, societies, and wardennial team putting on events throughout the year, there are always wonderful things to do. As well as this, you can always host your own events within the halls using the bookable spaces, and you'll always find a wealth of people willing to come along.

>>LAURA: Hi, welcome to David Russell Apartments. I'm Laura. I lived here in my first year, and I'm going to be your tour guide today.

David Russell Apartments is the University's largest hall of residence, with over 1,000 students living here. We're just a short walk from town and very near to the University sports building, which is very convenient.

David Russell Apartments is made up of individual buildings which are each made up of five-person flats.

You'll each have your en suite room, and you'll share a kitchen with five or six other housemates, so it's a great way to meet other people.

As you can see, David Russell Apartments is absolutely beautiful, and there are lots of green spaces around with picnic benches for studying and socialising.

David Russell also has its own computer labs, which are really useful, with its own printing facilities.

And there's a reception on-site, which are there to help you with any concerns, as well as a wardennial team which are there to help you with anything you might need.

David Russell also has a wardennial team, so when you arrive here, each building has its own assigned warden. They're here 24/7, and they're available to help with anything that you might need help with. My warden was lovely - she left chocolate coins on our desk round about exam season. And they're always available for a chat or just to answer any questions you may have.

David Russell Apartments also has its own bar called Dragon's Den, and opposite that is a lot of games. So we have pool, table tennis, we have a TV so you can relax and hang out with friends. There's also events that go on such as pool tournaments and table tennis tournaments which can get very competitive. And it's a great way to hang out with friends after a long day studying.

David Russell has catered and self-catered students. Catered students will eat in their dining hall, which serves breakfast and dinner Monday through Friday, and breakfast or lunch on the weekends. They can cater to a lot of different dietary requirements as I know from personal experience. And they're always really helpful and friendly.

David Russell is made up of individual buildings which each have about 12 flats in them, and within your flat, there'll be five or six rooms, and you'll share a kitchen and communal area, and you'll have the own privacy of your own bathroom.

The kitchens are a great place to hang out and cook with your flatmates if you are self-catered. My favourite memories here at David Russell were baking in our kitchen; we made a wide variety of different foods which we served to everyone else in the building, and we used to hang out in the evenings and study in the kitchen together which wasn't the most productive thing, but it was certainly a lot of fun.

And other times we would just take a walk around these places just to clear our head, and that was a really great way to relax.

Each hall of residence here has their own hall committee made up of students, and DRA is no exception. They'll organise events throughout the year to keep you entertained, ranging from full tournaments at Dragon's Den all the way up to the annual David Russell Apartments Ball, which last year was held on Lower College Lawn and was a really great night.

One of the reasons why I enjoyed living here so much in my first year was because it's such a big community, it's very vibrant and there's always something going on. But equally, if you just want to spend time with a few friends, that's fine too.

>>CONNOR: Hi there, I'm Connor. I'm a fourth-year student, and I study history, and today I'm going to be talking about McIntosh Hall.

McIntosh was originally built as a hotel, so it has big long corridors which means that it's perfect for student living.

I'm currently standing in the cabbage patch, which is McIntosh's garden.

It's also in the center of town, so I can see the Union from where I'm currently standing, so it's really convenient for everything, for class as well.

McIntosh is a mix of shared and single rooms. Everyone is catered, and there are shared bathrooms.

This is the dining hall of McIntosh. It is a nice big open space as you can see. In McIntosh, they serve 19 meals a week, so Monday to Friday you get all three meals - breakfast, lunch and dinner - and on a weekend you get breakfast and
lunch, which is really good because then if you're meeting friends to go out for
dinner or you just want to stay in at the weekends, that's completely up to you, and you don't feel like you're obliged to go to the meal.

The meals themselves are excellent, and the staff are super friendly, and they're
more than happy to cater to any dietary requirements. There's always a vegetarian option, there's always a vegan option, and there's lots and lots of variety in terms of salads and cereals and sides and desserts and everything you could think of.

This is the McIntosh common room. As you can see, it's a great space for chilling, hanging out, partying, whatever you want to do at McIntosh.

The social life at McIntosh and all the other halls at St Andrews are really, really good. So there's a student-run committee made up of students who currently live in the hall, and there's also space for freshers reps as well, so feel free
to get involved when you come.

They organise lots and lots of different events, particularly in freshers week, to get everyone knowing each other. So there'll be events to find your academic family, there'll be events such as movie nights, quiz nights and maybe cheap bars. They also do Mario Kart tournaments, which are great fun.

So the wardennial system at the halls is a really great set up. All the wardens are either postgraduate students, possibly PhD candidates or possibly not, but they live in the halls with you, and you'll see them at meal times, you'll see them wandering about. So they are there to support you, and they are in a sense going through the same thing as you, so they are there to support you and all your pastoral needs: so, to help you find your feet at university, to help you through challenges of studying, and all of the needs that you think of, the wardens are there to help.

And they will also organise lots of different events as well to keep you busy. When I was in halls, the wardens would come around with pizza during exam time, which was really helpful for when I was trying to study.

So on top of the dining hall at McIntosh on every floor, there's also a kitchen which you can use any time of day to sort out any of your needs. There's lots and lots of things in there, plenty of cupboards placed, plenty of fridge space, and they're always open for you. So if you're studying late at night and need a cup of tea, if you're making dinner for yourself or friends at the weekend, that's what they're there for. One kitchen on every floor may not seem like a lot, but you can also move between the floors for your kitchens, so if you have friends up the stairs, you can go up there and make dinner with them, and that's absolutely no problem. 

So the rooms at McIntosh come in a variety of shapes and sizes just because of the fact that it is an old building. And some of your rooms will be shared, some of the rooms will be single, but in every room you will find a bed, a chest of drawers, a wardrobe, and quite often a sink as well, and a desk. If it's a shared room, don't worry: it's not one desk and one wardrobe between two, everyone gets one of everything.

The halls are really good because, especially at McIntosh, some of the views out the windows are excellent, so you can wake up and study and look out onto the sea.

So this is one of the study spaces at McIntosh. There are a variety. This one is a shared study space, but you also have single desk ones, so depending on what type of studying you want to be doing. The other great thing about this room are the views you can see right over West Sands as well, which makes a really
good space to study and clear your heads.

When you're at the University, there are a variety of places that you can use, either in your hall or outwith. McIntosh is really good because the Library is straight down the street, so if you need to go and get a book, it's right there, and there's all the study spaces there.

On top of that, St Andrews has the Eduroam service for wifi, so when you come
in freshers week, they will set you up onto Eduroam. And you have free wifi in all of the University buildings, so you can walk down to the Library and still stay on the wifi.

So McIntosh is a standard accommodation, which means that you would share a
bathroom, but don't worry, I never had to wait in line in the year I spent in
halls. There are a mixture of single stall units with a lockable door and a row of stalls, and they're cleaned daily which is great.

So the community spirit in halls is really great. It's one of the things I loved most about first year, and it's where I made some of the best friends that I still have today, now in fourth year. There's always events going on, always people chatting, whether it's hanging out in the common room, or in the kitchen making dinner, or out around town, on the beach, doing whatever.

The fact that the halls are there and provide such a community effort is one of the things that makes St Andrews really, really great as a place to study.

For more information about accommodation at St Andrews, please visit
our website. 

[TEXT: Find out more www.st-andrews.ac.uk/study/accommodation]