Room Ballot

As you may know, as a member of St. Mary's, you will be swapping rooms every term in your first year (of undergraduate study) living in college (ERASMUS students are exempt, though can join in if they wish). This page aims to tell you how this works. Only first years have to ballot, other years can choose to opt in.

Next room ballot: Wednesday 7th March Corridor list deadline: Friday 2nd March Concession deadline: Wednesday 29th February Moving day: N/A

What is the room ballot?

The room ballot is the process whereby everyone selects their rooms for the next term in a tried and tested fair way. The JCR Vice President is prodominantly in charge of the whole affair, so please email them if you have any further queries, please read further for more information.

How does the room ballot work?

During the weeks leading up to the room ballot the Vice President will contact everyone asking them to organise themselves into corridors of up to 6 people. Your corridor is simply a group of people that you would like to select your room at the same time as. They do not have to be people on your current corridor, nor must you end up on the same corridor with them. This is the point where other years can opt into the room ballot. To submit your corridor list click here. If possible, could only one person per corridor groupl submit the list.
If a corridor list is not submitted with your name, then you will ballot by yourself.
Should you feel that you require a particular room or have particular needs i.e. medical, social, religious or personal you may apply for a concession. The concession forms can be downloaded from a link at the bottom of this page. Once the form is filled in, it should be sent to Dr. Gillian Boughton via Dorothy Grieve. Dr. Boughton will assess the concession and determine whether or not it will be granted.
If you have already had a concession, i.e. filled one out before arrival in durham then you should send an email to the Vice President informing them that you still wish your concession to be considered. It is important you do this as the concession may be overlooked otherwise.
Once all the corridor lists have been submitted, the average score (dependent on the rooms, see 'Room Scores' below) is taken and this is used as a weighting in the random process.
The random process is carried out using a computer program. Each corridor will be assigned a random time slot to go and select their rooms for the next term. There is a hierarchy as to who chooses first (though within each group it is random), which is as follows:

Concessions
Fourth years
Third years
Second years
First years as ranked by their points

A few days before the room ballot, times for the corridor groups to come and select their rooms are released and displayed. If somone in the group cannot make the time, it is their responsibility to ask someone else in the group to be responsible for picking their room. This is the point where you can choose to share with someone in your Corridor list.
On the day you will be asked to come to a room where you will be presented with a map of the rooms in the college (of which, copies can be downloaded from below) and you will be asked to select your rooms. It is recommended that you have a good idea of which room you would like before entering the room since the day will be following a strict timetable.
Please note that we do not have maps for the Teikyo rooms but they will be available.

What are the room scores?

The room scores are a way of ensuring that everyone shares at some point during the year. The scores are as follows:
Double room - 3 points
Single room - 1 point (including En-suites)
Teikyo Residence- 2 Points
Shepherd's Wing Residence- 2 points

The points for your corridor are averaged then used as a weighting.

Note that the points are cumulative over the two terms.

Frequently asked questions:

What if I forget to submit my corridor list before the deadline?
The Vice President will know who hasn't been assigned to a corridor list and will organise them into corridor lists at their discretion.

What if I've been placed in more than one corridor list?
You will be left in the corridor list that was first submitted unless you have asked otherwise.

I'm not a first year, can I still change my room?
Yes, all you have to do is enter yourself into a corridor list.

What if none of my group can make the time slot?
You can nominate somone else (or a couple of people) to choose in your place, providing that the Vice President has been informed, otherwise their choices for you will not be valid. You may also provide the Vice-President with a list of preferred rooms and they will try to find one as similar as possible. If no one comes in your place at your time slot, the process cannot wait for you so the next lot will be allowed to select their rooms. There will be a window of half an hour from your timeslot to appear and choose your own rooms (at which point more rooms will have been taken up) otherwise, the Vice President will choose for you at their discretion.

I'm a mature/ERASMUS student, do I still have to enter the room ballot?
You do not have to enter, however, if you would like to then that is perfectly fine, just enter yourself into a corridor list.

If you have any other questions please email the JCR Vice President at anthony.packer@durham.ac.uk

Subpages (2): Corridor Lists Moving Day

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FergussonFirstSecondThird.pdf

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FergussonGround.pdf

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Anthony Packer,

24 Nov 2010 12:43

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