Anna's experience living on and off campus

In your first year of University you are most likely to be living on campus, but in the second year you may need to find local accommodation. In this blog, Anna discusses her experience of living on and off campus and the benefits to both options.

I would say that one of the best things about being an undergraduate student at Warwick Business School is the campus. It creates a close-knit community and you can find everything you need, which is useful when you are living on campus. In my first year I lived in Bluebell accommodation on central campus, and I shared a flat with seven other people from all over the world. We were all first years, but we all studied different degrees. I lived with people from Sweden, England, Turkey, China, Croatia, and South Korea. In your housing application, you get to write a short statement about yourself sharing your interests and you can say things like whether you are a morning or evening person. This makes it easier for the Warwick Accommodation team to place you with people that you will get along well with. Most people tend to make friends for life with their flat mates. That was the case for me, and even though my flat mates have all graduated now we still talk and meet up regularly. We had a lot of fun living together, including cooking a traditional British Christmas Dinner and introducing other traditional food from our home countries to each other.

Living on campus is also great because you have access to everything that you may need nearby; we have restaurants, bars, a grocery store and a food market. We have easy access to all of the activities going on, from being able to go to the University Gym in the Sports Centre, to going out in the evening to events such a POP! (the weekly student night hosted in the Students’ Union), attend networking sessions with prospective employers or go to the student cinema at the Art Centre to see the latest releases. You are constantly surrounded by your friends and can easily meet up with course mates to study together or work on group projects in the library, WBS Undergraduate study space or out on the grass if the weather is nice!

In my second year I moved to Leamington Spa and I enjoyed the location so much that I decided to live there when I came back after my year abroad. Leamington is a cute little town where you can find (almost) everything you might need, from good restaurants, bars and nightclubs to parks and riverside walks to Warwick Castle. There is also easy access to bigger cities, with several trains to Birmingham or London every hour. Second year also gives you the option of how you want to live; do you want to share a large house with seven of your friends, or maybe live with a close friend in a two-bedroom apartment? The choice is yours. I decided to live with my best friend from first year in a flat. Having our own flat that we could decorate was amazing! Although we often ended up visiting my previous flatmates who lived just a ten-minutes’ walk away.

Leamington has a bit of everything for everyone, quite a lot of my friends ended up living there which meant it was easy to meet up on the weekend. Another bonus to living in Leamington Spa is that the University has a learning grid located in the Town Hall. So during the exam period you can go there to revise closer to home rather than going onto campus. Another plus with the Leamington Learning Grid is that you can book a study space in advance or even book a study room to work on a group project together.

Overall, what I enjoy the most about being an undergraduate student here is the sense of community we have. There is always something going on both on and off campus and there are numerous locations to meet up with your friends. 

If you have any questions about accommodation, you can contact Warwick Accommodation. The accommodation team can help with both on and off campus living arrangements.