Student Accommodation
 

I shall shortly be moving to London to go to university only I forgot to apply for student accommidation and now I'm on a waiting list. I think I should start looking for a plsce to live. What I'm looking for is something cheap. Where shall I begin?

Re: Student Accommidation
 

Houseboats!

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What pab said,

why are you going to uni?

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Something to do, innit?

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I thought you were poor and had no money, surely a job would be more sensible?

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*sigh*

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What?

If I could afford to bum around and go to uni for another year or three I would, but I can't. So resigned myself to getting a job.

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I didn't ask for your opinion, much less your blessing. All I want is advice to prevent me living on the street*, nothing else. If you want to have the 'why don't you get a job?' stop again then there are plenty of fully-formed threads for you to have a wank over.


*murdering Midge5 and taking his home

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I want to know why you are going to university.

I asked you first time. You ignored the question. So I commented on the job the second time. You ignored the jibe, third time I just didn't care and gave my opinion.

You see theres only so much internet cool you can have, how about you tell us why you are going back to uni. I was actually genuinelly interested. Where are you going, studying etc.

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It's something to do. My job acquiring issues have been rather well-publicised so I'm going back to uni. I'm going to study for an MRes in Politics at Goldsmiths.

I'm looking to study something I enjoy and gain some research-based skills. I am also looking for a paid part-time internship, but apparantly these don't actually exist, so I'm looking for a part-time job and a rather limited internship. I'm well aware this may actually cause me to work myself to death, but so will stayign at home being an unemployed.

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Wouldn't it be sensible to study something that actually got you a job?
Studying politics is about as useful for the average student on the job marked as polishing your knob at regular intervals.

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Christ!

*deep breath*

OK!

I want to move into the field of politics. I would like to work for a think tank or some such organisation. I would like go develop my research skills (see this thread) and use the oppertunity to to boost my CV and gain some intern experiance which is rather scarce outside of London (practically unheard of in Cardiff).

What do you suggest?

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David Beckham Studies?

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For future reference, it's accommodation.

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A woman on the phone asked me to spell it and I got it wrong and ever since I've lost confidence in the word!

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Confedence. It's true!

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Hey man don't go trying to take the "i'll be a student for the rest of my life" internet niche, nod's got that one firmly sewn up :salute:

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Yes you should definitely not do it because nod has done it and it's something most other people do no do (except nod) and this is the reason that you should not do it unless it's something you've thought about thoroughly but it's probably just nodrog making you do it because he's one of your peers and so you should definitely not do it.

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Good luck ASG ! Gumtree is your best bet.

There's a few internships usually floating around the assembly or Cardiff council also you might want to think about applying for the Civil Service, I think their Fast Stream applications open in September and they only want a 2:2.

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Civil Service Fast Stream. 10,000 plus applicants. 300 places. Good luck.

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It's not that bad, they get a lot of dire applications because of the entry requirements plus it's more like 500 spots, it's easier to get into than a lot of other jobs for example investment banking. The great thing about it is that they'll consider you with a 2:2 which opens it to a lot more people who can make up for worse academics with other skills. The assessments can be quite intense though I'll give you that.

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Please see the PDF link for figures

In short if you're not an Economist or a Statitician you are competing for one of 219 places with 9,500 other graduates. I was also including in house applicants first time round (i forgot to weed them out from the figures i'd heard).

Not that i'm necessarily trying to be down on ASG, i'm just informing him (and you) of the stats.

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ALSO if you're not from Cambridge (58/563 successful applicants) or Oxford (69/734 successful applicants) you're chances are again reduced quite significantly (92 places for 8,200ish applicants).

STATS ARE FUN!

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So 1 job per 89 applicants. There was an article in the London Paper recently where they carried stats on the average number of graduate applications for different industries, banking and insurance were both over 100 appications per role. FMCG had like 250 applications for job, I don’t even know what FMCG is !

I felt the Fast Stream application process was unbiased in terms of institution attended, even though in the final round there were a lot of Oxbridge people the assessors don't know which university you've attended they make their recommendation blind. That brings it all the way down to 43 applicants per job, it sounds a lot but welcome to the world of graduate recruitment.

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In a lot of jobs (a depressing amount, actually) there's almost no interest shown in what your degree is in - you just need to have one. Having a Masters (in literally anything) will aid job prospects and in some cases automatically lead to more pay.

edit : Those x applicants for y jobs figures need to take into account that some people seem to apply for ten thousand schemes each.

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Why is this depressing?

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I think its ideal, because no matter what your degree is in, you can still go for any job that tickles your fancy. :)

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"See that thing you spent 3 or 4 years doing. We don't care about your motivations or interests in that at all."

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Gumtree is definitely a good option for you. You could also try http://housing.london.ac.uk as they have a database of properties which you can search through.

Other than that I would try and find out if your university has an online noticeboard. When I was at uni there were always people posting on ours searching for an extra housemate, as well as people in your situation searching for a house.

Good luck.

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Thanks, there have been some very good suggestions here and whilst I would love to live on a houseboat by the Isle of Dogs I don't think travelling to uni will be quite as easy as it could be.

Having no desire to walk long distances or rely on public transport to make it to lectures on time (I'll be late for my funeral, honestly) I'm looking to live in New Cross or the immediate area.

Is this a nice area or will I get stabbed?

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Have you ever been to new cross?!

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Well clearly I havn't, which is why I#m asking what it's like. :confused:

But the '?!' has me worried about the conditions in New Cross.

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It's a bit of a dive but you could do worse ! Maybe you should pop up on a weekend and take a look around some of these areas. Singles from Cardiff are only like £6 on the weekend if you book early enough.

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I don't know anything about New Cross except that it'll probably take you ages to get into central London from there (from looking at the tube map). Although the buses are probably quite good.

Which uni are you going to, and where is it based in London?

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I'm going to Goldsmiths. It's in New Cross.

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Oh, then ignore the comment about transport taking ages!

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Well I don't want to live miles out of the city, especially if it means living in a dive.

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New Cross is definitely a dive, although you're not that likely to be stabbed there (compared to some). There's a reasonably large student population in the area, and a fair selection of places to drink in. It's also not "miles out" from anywhere, unless you're defining London as a ten foot box in Trafalgar Square.

The train from their to London Bridge is pretty quick and the East London Line although not as useful as the central lines takes you to bunch of trendyish places in Shoreditch, etc.

Having said that, I commuted through that area for three years and have been going through it occassionally for close to a decade now and I always find it a vaguely depressing place. It's got some of the same social problems as Brixton or Peckham but without the same charm/vibe. That's just personal bias though, outside my own self-defined parish I tend to see South London for what it is.

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what charm has peckham got exactly?

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New Cross is ****ing shit.

Yes, Goldsmiths is there, but if you wish to leave the area, and you will, you've got a job on your hands.

That said, it's got some alright pubs and I've never been mugged there whenever I've actually ventured to the area.

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I'm not really sure. Perhaps it's just vaguely more culturally significant than other similar areas.

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If those of you who are interested* I was offered a place at the very last moment and I am now living in student halls.

Once again, this proves that leaving things to the very last moment does work!

*ie no-one, this is really for my own benefit

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Wheres your halls?

I'm living the dream in Elephant & Castle (East Street Market to be exact...it's zone 1!)

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I'm living the nightmare at home in Chelmsford :(

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The Halls are in Brockley, about a half hour walk from my uni. This is good as it allows me to get some exercise, but not too much.

It's in Zone 2 I think and is only a hort bus ride into Lewisham Town Centre, which I was surprised to find doesn't have a record store (Woolworths and WH Smiths don't really count) so I'm going to have to find one, not having the internet or my computer or my CD collection.

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ASG: Are you actually studying something useful to get a job, or is this another waste of money like your last stab at higher education?

|edit| And by this post i hope you have come to your sences and found something decent

Dante:
Well, to a certain degree (no pun intended) that is true.
But if I had a application on my table and all i see if some 30 year old chap with politics studies and other useless crap in the normal world and no real world experience, I would use it as toilet paper.

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Wow, you really are a thoroughly unlikable human being aren't you?

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I have my moments yes :)