Life as a Tampines House boarder

Living as part of a residential or boarding community is quite different from living at home. On the one hand, you get to be with your friends almost all the time, and the relationships that you form here will be some of the strongest that you'll have throughout your life. On the other hand, you will have to acknowledge, accept and even submit to the norms, values and expectations of the greater boarding community, some of which may be quite different from what you are used to. It is important to realise that you will be sharing your time and personal space with a lot of other people, and this requires a greater degree of self-management, consideration and good humour than if you were simply living at home with your family.

Another thing to note is that your freedom will be somewhat restricted as long as you live in a boarding community: in order to take good care of a big community such as ours, we need to have fairly rigid rules and structures in place to safeguard and promote the well-being of every member of the community. This means that you will not always be able to do what you want whenever you like - you will always need to keep in mind the needs of your room mate, corridor mates and fellow boarders. The following excerpt from the UWC Code of Conduct summarises this well:

"At the heart of the UWC ethos is respect for others in all our actions and words. This means that we must think about the common good and be able to rise above our individual desires and needs. In short, our ideals require good heartedness from all members of the UWC community and a recognition that cultural norms are diverse."

Boarding community activities

Click on the pictures below to find out more about the various activities that we offer to help grow and develop together as a community.

Meals

Boarders' meals are taken either in the College canteen (lunch) or in Santai, our College cafe (breakfast and dinner). A selection of Asian, Western and vegetarian options is usually available at every meal. 

Here are the menus for this week and next week:

Facilities

Boarders have access to various shared common spaces across 14 floors. We have balconies, reading rooms, a kitchen, a games room, a music space, a prayer room, sports equipment, a film room and breakout spaces all available to anyone in house. 

Facilities - Dorms

• Boarders have access to their corridor only, via swipe access card.

• Grades 8-9 have shared dorms 

• Grades 10-11 have shared dorms in pairs

• Grade 12s have single dorms