University advised us to secure digs that we don’t need
As college classes go online, many students now face unwanted bills
COLLEGE life will be spent offcampus this academic year. That’s the reality for the thousands of students returning to third-level courses and starting degrees later this month.
And many are furious they have wasted time and money looking for accommodation they will not need.
Among them is Oisín Bradley, from Milford, Co. Donegal, who discovered last week that he will only have four-and-a-half hours of lectures at National University of Ireland Galway instead of the normal 18-20 hours.
The fourth year Arts and Journalism student spent last year studying in Belgium as part of the Erasmus exchange programme.
When NUIG sent an email to students in June advising them to ‘book accommodation and expect to be present in Galway throughout the semester’, Oisín and his friends started house hunting.
Oisín says: ‘I lived on campus in first and second year and I started looking for accommodation from June. I was going off what NUIG was saying… they were saying there was a chance you would be on campus and they were advising you to get accommodation.
‘I started looking in the usual places and we looked at a few houses. We got a house and there will be four of us in it.
‘We’re all final year students and we put down a €400 deposit and we signed a 10-month lease which starts on September 14. The rent is €100 a week each and then there will be more for electricity so I would say it will cost me about €150€160 a week to live.
‘We put down the deposit a month early, in August, and we got indicative timetables last week.
‘I’ll only have four-and-a-half hours a week in college and I have no idea whether that will be spread over one day or five days.
‘Normally I would have had 18-20 hours over five days. I believe they are trying to push the idea of attending the lectures online and only go to the lectures if you’re having problems.
‘I regret I heeded the advice the college was giving. It would have been a lot easier if I hadn’t… I probably would have stayed at home to be honest, stayed working in my part-time job and saved money.
‘We all got the house together and we are all in different faculties and some of the others need to be in Galway.
‘I’ll probably go to Galway at this stage but I’ve still not made up my mind 100% what I will do… the library will be open and a lot of things on campus will be open, the study schools will be open.
‘I wouldn’t be sure about the social life. I won’t be taking part in it anyway because my dad would be at risk. He has a chest condition and it wouldn’t be worth the risk.’ He added: ‘I appreciate this is a different scenario for the college but they knew it was coming down the tracks.
‘They’ve had months upon months to decide what they were going to do. They have made things more difficult for students than they needed to be.
‘A lot of people think this is completely unfair for students as well as for parents who would be paying for first-year students.
‘A lot of them won’t have the means or else it will be a stretch for them to send students to college.’ Meanwhile, several distressed parents have already contacted the university’s students’ union worried about getting loans to pay for accommodation that their children may not need.
NUIG defended its decision last night advising students to pay for full-time accommodation even though many will only be on campus for a few hours a week. A spokeswoman for the university said: ‘Indicative schedules were issued to students at the start of the week, with information on the balance of oncampus and online teaching for their individual course for the coming academic year. ‘All students are encouraged to be in Galway from September to be available for on-campus learning and to experience the fullest student learning experience possible given the Covid-19 restrictions.’
Meanwhile, University College Dublin has been accused of profiting from the Covid-19 pandemic and the housing crisis by increasing fees for on-campus student accommodation.
However, UCD has denied the allegations, instead insisting the price increases were announced during the last academic year.
Living on campus is not cheap. Costs for an academic year vary from €7,392 to €11,317 and, according to UCD students’ union welfare officer Ruairí Power, the university should be providing more affordable housing for its 25,000 students instead of increasing prices.
He said: ‘This is in the middle of a pandemic when people don’t want to do digs.
Mr Power went on: ‘People doing digs are usually elderly couples giving a room to a student but that
‘I’ll only have 4.5 hours a week in college’
is just not happening this year.
‘Accommodation is the big issue. The university has raised the rent by 4%, the rate went up during the last trimester and it will go up by another 4% next year.
‘Other universities abandoned plans to do the same this year.
‘A lot of the new accommodation is luxury accommodation but what students want is a secure, safe and affordable place to stay. It is very important that middle-class and working-class students have access to university.
‘The university needs to do more to accommodate lower income students.’
Dublin City University has come up with a novel solution to help students avoid paying for full-time accommodation while going to college on a part-time basis.
More than 18,000 students are expected to enrol at DCU later this month but most of them will not attend lectures in person.
Instead they will study online and students will only visit DCU’s three campuses for tutorials, seminars, sessions in laboratories and other practical workshops.
As a result, the college is offering students hotel/hostel-style accommodation which they can book on a night-to-night basis.
A DCU spokesman explained: ‘Students will be able to book oncampus accommodation for the academic year, a semester or specific days/weeks for the 2020/2021 academic year.
‘The initial allocation of on-campus residences took place in early June through the normal lottery process for all students who have applied for rooms through the DCU accommodation portal.
‘Any student who is successful in receiving an offer will be able to secure that room by means of a fully refundable deposit. ‘Once degree programme timetables have been issued, students with initial on-campus room offers will have two weeks to update their details and to confirm whether or not they need accommodation for the full semester or for specific dates.’
The spokesman added: ‘As far as possible, students will be scheduled on campus for a reasonable length of time (ie no less than half a day) to help minimise commuting times to campus.’
‘People doing digs are usually elderly couples’