Bridging cultures, more felt in 2019. Starting summer of the school year 2019-2020, the Ateneo Residence Hall has opened its doors to a number of dormers already. With an estimated 120 local students and a handful of international people are residing in the dorm, Ateneo’s plan of improving the international relations can already be said to be working. The Office of International Relations is expecting an influx of student applicants by the 2nd to the 3rd week of July. This is because this will be the time that the 1 semester long and 1 year long international students of the Loyola schools will be enrolling in Ateneo. It is also because this school year Ateneo will be welcoming more freshmen students enrolling than usual, there will be more students expected to be availing the dorm package offered. “There will be an estimated 2,800 incoming freshmen coming this year, compared to the 1,300 freshmen in the school year 2018-2019, so there’s an increase of 1,500 students,” said Mr. Rem Casino, OrSem Moderator.
Given that the International Residence Hall can only house 310 students, with 2 students per room, each student applicant will be screened before they can get to live in the new dorm. It was initially proposed that the new dorm will be following the 60% international student to 40% local student scheme. However, given the increased number of local students compared to the steady number of the number of international students, the possibility of this scheme may not be followed. From the Office of the VP for University and Global Relations (OPVPUGR), Ms. Karen C. Sunico, has yet to comment about the screening process and if they shall be strict in following the 60% international student to 40% local student scheme.
Currently, some of the amenities in the dorm are still not fully functional and certain locations in the dorm are still under construction. However, the rooms where the students can stay in are already furnished and the essentials in the room like the bed, bathroom, and study can be used and are fully functional.
It is rumored that similar to the other university dorms within the Ateneo, the International Residence Hall will also be accommodating scholars. Given that the new dorm is the biggest and most updated in terms of amenities, the cost of living in the dorm is very high, and accepting scholars will be considered to be a wonderful opportunity.
Recently, the Office of International Relations has used this dorm as the housing of the school’s short term international visitors. It housed 29 students and 2 professors from Nagano University, Japan. They have stayed in the International Residence Halls for 27 days, June 2-29, 2019. Haruhi, a student from Nagano University that has stayed in the new dorm commented: “The building is very nice, it’s very big, but it is noisy because of the construction”.
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