At the sound of my alarm, I prise my eyes open and let the room fall into focus. My clock reads 09:50. My lecture starts at ten. In one fluid movement I ease myself out of bed, eat, and burn it out the door. By ten o' clock, I'm sat in the lecture hall.
This is one of the main benefits of staying in halls. If you're fortunate enough to have a bar on campus, you've effectively got cheap beer and good atmos on your doorstep. And after indulging in said cheap beer and good atmos the previous night, you have the luxury of leaving minutes before your lecture and arrive on time. I found it got easier with time: when I first started university I gave myself a good half hour to prepare in the mornings. But by the end of the year I had my routine shaved to record time, and could go from laying in bed to sitting in the class room in minutes. Then again, I'm among the student percentage not too bothered about typical morning routine; some people can't leave their house without a shower and breakfast. I saved washing until lectures finished and grabbed an apple on the way there. This was made possible because my room was about a three-minute walk from the lecture hall - a benefit to those with even the most extensive morning preparations.
Most campuses I've visited have a definite sense of community. That what campus is, a community. Every other person in halls shares a similar lifestyle to you. You go to the same bars, you all have lectures. And most universities have a large enough population to keep you socially stimulated. But with such plentiful entertainment piling up on your doorstep, it's easy to forget that looming, sometimes unspeakable thing called the real world. It is too easy to become trapped in the campus bubble, and if you find yourself struggling to recall the last time you ventured beyond the Uni gates, it may be time to spend awhile in the great beyond. Because university is about diversity (pardon the cheese). Diverse people, diverse experiences, diverse ideas, diverse places. So get out there and diversify!
Many universities (especially those in London) have their halls of residence scattered around the city, instead of having everything centralized around one campus. This could be very beneficial as it forces students to interact with the outside world.
Halls may be an integral part of "the university experience," but may feel over pampered. I stayed in halls where cleaners mopped our kitchen, emptied our bins, cleaned our en suite bathrooms and vacuumed our bedrooms weekly. There were security guards at the gate keeping all the baddies out, and I had to clear with them if anyone from off campus stayed over. I occasionally felt like a big, faceless institution had replaced my parents. To an extent this was very useful (the cleaners especially), but for a lot of people, university is the first time living away from home, and they may want to assert their independence, no bad thing at all.
But, the question that will have the most swing on a decision: how cheap is it? Well, I was offered the choice between four different halls last year. The cheaper they were, the fewer perks they had (cleaners, en suites, etc.). I chose the most expensive halls. And it was still cheaper than the house I live in now (which has none of the above perks). For the broke student, halls are more appealing financially, unless you share a small house with lots of people.
Halls can be an amazing experience; just don't forget that life exists beyond the campus bubble.
