Advice for a person moving away for College!

LouiseOD

Hi everyone!

I've searched the forum, but haven't found any recent thread on this topic. Here's my story!:

So, I live in Cork City, a bus away from both the IT and University. Both have an incredible range of courses so I never really considered moving away for college. I am pretty independent and free here at home and figured I'd get the best of both worlds: Lots of the fun, nights out etc that goes along with college as well as the comfort of my own bed

Well, about a week before Change of Mind closed, I decided maybe I should look at NUIG. The points are lower there, I've heard its pretty good craic and I would be much better able to cope with a city thats not too much bigger/smaller than my home.

So, here I am in July, looking at accomodation near NUI Glaway. Aaaaargh!

What I'm hoping is that people will have advice on good (and hopefully cheap) accommodation, whether I should be looking at 5 or 7 day stays and how I should travel to college etc.

Oh, and of course what I should bring with me...anything that would make me some friends in Galway? :P

Thanks in advance for the help!

LilMissCiara

LouiseOD wrote: »

Hi everyone!

I've searched the forum, but haven't found any recent thread on this topic. Here's my story!:

So, I live in Cork City, a bus away from both the IT and University. Both have an incredible range of courses so I never really considered moving away for college. I am pretty independent and free here at home and figured I'd get the best of both worlds: Lots of the fun, nights out etc that goes along with college as well as the comfort of my own bed

Well, about a week before Change of Mind closed, I decided maybe I should look at NUIG. The points are lower there, I've heard its pretty good craic and I would be much better able to cope with a city thats not too much bigger/smaller than my home.

So, here I am in July, looking at accomodation near NUI Glaway. Aaaaargh!

What I'm hoping is that people will have advice on good (and hopefully cheap) accommodation, whether I should be looking at 5 or 7 day stays and how I should travel to college etc.

Oh, and of course what I should bring with me...anything that would make me some friends in Galway? :P

Thanks in advance for the help!

You should ask one of the mods to move this to the NUIG forum because most people here are Leaving Certs as well so we don't have much experience on that sorta stuff!

There is Corrib Village (€800 deposit :eek:) which has a reputation for being really good craic (lots of drink etc.) but the accommodation is apparently bad quality. Unless you stay in digs all accommodation will be 7 days (42 week or so contract for official student accommodation or month by month if you rent a house/room from a landlord).

whadabouchasir

LouiseOD wrote: »

So, here I am in July, looking at accomodation near NUI Glaway. Aaaaargh!

What I'm hoping is that people will have advice on good (and hopefully cheap) accommodation, whether I should be looking at 5 or 7 day stays and how I should travel to college etc.

Oh, and of course what I should bring with me...anything that would make me some friends in Galway? :P

Thanks in advance for the help!

Daft.ie is probably the best site for private accomadation.You could also try some of the student accomadation,corrib village,Dunaras and Gort na Coirbe.Although these are quite a bit more expensive.As regards getting to college,Galway is a fairly Small city and you should easily be able to get a place within walking distance of the college or you could cycle.

UrbanSea

I stayed at Corrib Village when in college there at the start of the year.
Great craic you meet an absolute load of people but the quality of the accommodation is awful. The houses are freezing,you get a tiny undercounter fridge between all ofnye,where the freezer is just an ice box at the top,unless you pay more for an apartment where you get a separate undercounter freezer and a counter top dishwasher.
It's handy regards getting to college as it's only a 5 minute walk and grand for goingout,you can walk into town in about 15 minutes and a taxi is about 8 euro.

paperpackages

As regards accommodation, I agree that Corrib Village seems the most popular choice. However, I didn't realise the problems with it until I read other posts. If you could arrange to share a house with other people it would be very handy. A lot of students in Galway in the Menlo/Newcastle/Dangan/Bushypark area do that.
As for making friends, I almost envy the people coming to Galway from other places as you're more likely to meet people through your accommodation, especially in a place like Corrib Village! I'm thinking of joining some societies though. What course are you interested in doing?

QueenOfLeon

There is an accommodation thread in the NUIG forum which you can search through for all the available ones! I stayed in Corrib Village in first year, I loved it, the standard wasn't brilliant but its all first years and very close to the college so its brilliant

Like someone said, most people reading here are in your situation too but if you search through the university forums you'll find some similiar threads about moving away from home for the first time.

For example: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=67807306

The only accommodation that would restrict you to five days is digs which is where you live in with a family and get meals cooked for you. Some people love it but I'd advise student accommodation or a student house.

As for transport, do you mean in and out to college every day? Most places in Galway are within walking distance, one of the student accommodations (Dunaras) provides a bus in and out every day, and there are buses from Eyre Square over if you're living out that direction. Nowhere is really more than 15 minutes walk though.

seriouslysweet

Galway is really small. You'll walk most places. Also, I'd advise renting for a month or two and seeing can you move in with new friends then, that way you get a month or two of hassle free renting and then can decide what you want to do, there are a fair few places on daft, Newcastle and Dangan are the popular places as are near all the other areas of the college and the sports facilities.