Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Cromwell Has Been Renovated!

Hello all!

As of Fall 2013, Cromwell Hall has been completely renovated. That means that it's no longer a freshman dorm, and unfortunately, that this blog is no longer accurate (for now.)

I'll be keeping this blog active for two reasons;
1) Posterity. Hopefully now, everyone can appreciate what Cromwell used to look like.
2) Updating it. I recently graduated from TCNJ, but I'm interested in keeping this resource alive for students.

So, if you send me your photos, I'll publish them (and credit you, of course.) This way we can keep the blog updated, and take care of everyone in the process.

My email is LivingInCromwell@gmail.com

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Living in Cromwell

First off, congratulations for getting accepted to TCNJ. Its a great school and you will thoroughly enjoy your time here. Secondly, I'd like to reassure you. You're not missing any of the freshman experience by rooming in Cromwell. The dorm has a great sense of community, and you won't have any issues making plenty of friends on your floor. Cromwell is a great place to live, and I really enjoyed my time there. You will too.


Now, what TCNJ doesn't do particularly well is tell you what you need for your time in Cromwell. The extent of the information they give you is a general floor-plan of the building, and tell you that you'll need overhead lighting. You're going to need a bit more than that. So to make sure you won't have to guess your way through the process like we did, a couple of my friends and I got together to create this blog.




And upon that note I present to you, Living in Cromwell.


Page Directory:
-Dorm Rooms
-Suite Bathrooms








If you have more questions, send me an email! 
My address is LivinginCromwell@gmail.com

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Cromwell Dorm Rooms

I'll start off by saying that the rooms at Cromwell are pretty nice. They'll comfortably house two people and all their belongings, no matter how you set up your room. That said, there is precious little information about the rooms, and TCNJ does a poor job of providing more to the resident.








The Floor:
The Floor plan will show you that there are several types of rooms.
-The most common is the standard suite. Six people live in three rooms, and share one bathroom.
-Each floor has several single-resident rooms. Most singles are paired, and share a bathroom with another single.
There are a couple exceptions, but the vast majority of rooms in Cromwell fall into those two categories. I know for a fact that the fifth floor on Cromwell has a 3-person apartment where most lounges are located, but those rooms are very uncommon.


There are usually 50(ish) people to a floor, with two Community Assistants per floor. TCNJ does a great job during Welcome Week, so by the end of the first week you'll be very close to your floor. 








The Rooms:
The standard suite is built for two people. It has two beds, two closets, two desks with chairs, and two small dressers that fit inside the closets. The beds are usually bunked, but you can un-bunk then if you want. My roommate and I didn't un-bunk our beds because we liked having the extra room. Since TCNJ doesn't provide pictures of the dorm rooms, I went and took my own.





Room 1:

 Room 1 was similarly laid out to room 3.

Door on the right goes directly to the hallway, with the left side leading into the bathroom.

Showing the backside of the room. Everyone wave hi to Mike...


Room 2:

 Room 2 has the furniture, but is laid out differently because of the location of the door.

 The beds have two small drawers underneath them. I ended up keeping my spare supplies underneath.

 As you can see, that side of the room was a bit cramped, albeit still usable.

 The window.



Room 3's Photos:


The closets along the wall nearby the door. Each closet is approximately 4' wide and 6' tall. We put the refrigerator and the microwave in the space behind the door and next to the closets.

The bunk beds. The College recommends to buy a twin-extra long, but I'll address that later.

 The desks have two drawers, and another small filing cabinet underneath them.

 The closets/dresser combination.

The beds alongside the windows and the desks. 





Dorm Lighting:
I will say one thing about the rooms. During the day you'll get plenty of sunlight through the windows, but at night you will need to have your own lights. There is no overhead lighting in any of the dorm rooms. You're going to need a lamp with at least three lightbulbs in your room, otherwise it'll be too dark to function.


A really popular model that I saw in the rooms was this 5-headed lamp. I bought this one, and it worked pretty well, once I stopped using incandescent light bulbs. Interestingly enough, the "Eco-friendly" lightbulbs worked so much better than the standard light bulbs. They didn't have that sickly yellow glow, and they won't burn you if you accidentally brush up against it.


Look for this type of light bulb when you go shopping next time:










Buying sheets & supplies from The College:
About halfway through summer TCNJ sends you a nice packet saying, "Buy our sheets, because normal ones won't fit our beds!". They also are very kind and send you another packet that allows you to buy shower shoes, towels, wash cloths, shower caddies, ect...


Buyer. Be. Warned.


Buying towels from this service was the biggest mistake I made. Most people would expect that a towel to dry you off. But instead these towels will leave you sopping wet, and to add insult to the injury, leave you completely full of fuzzy wet lint. 


The rest of the products weren't too bad. Personally, I had several holes in the bottom of my shower shoes, but I was the only person who I spoke to who had that issue. 


The sheets were a bit of a hit or miss also. If you do buy them, make sure you wash them and dry them on low heat ONLY. If not, they will shrink so much that you can barely fit them onto the top half of the mattress. Next year, I'm going to forgo them, and buy my own sheets.








Overall, the dorms at Cromwell are a great place to live. Every dorm will have its quirks, and this resource is here to make sure you're prepared for some of Cromwell's. You are going to have a great time at TCNJ, and you can be sure you'll look back on your days in Cromwell with a smile.


Resources:
TCNJ's Page on Cromwell:
https://www.tcnj.edu/~reslife/assignments/housing-fye.html#cr
TCNJ's Cromwell floor plan:
https://www.tcnj.edu/~reslife/assignments/floorplans/cromwell.pdf






More questions? Send me an email! 
My address is 
LivinginCromwell@gmail.com

Friday, May 13, 2011

Cromwell Bathrooms

As I've said before, Cromwell is suite-based dorm. Each suite has three rooms, and they all share a bathroom. The bathrooms have a couple of things you'll need to know about them.

The bathroom has two sinks, one shower, two cabinets, and one toilet. What they don't supply is cleaning materials, shower curtains, and shower curtain rings.


And yes, you have to learn clean your bathrooms yourselves. There is no maid service.


Bathroom Materials:
Here are the materials you'll need for your bathroom:
-Toilet plunger
-Trash bags
-Broom & Dustpan
-Latex cleaning gloves
-Glass cleaner
-Sink cleaner
-Disinfectant spray
-Mildew remover
-Tension Bar
-Paper towel stand
-Toilet Paper: You know those giant packs that have +12 packs? Bring at least one per room. Trust me, six people use a lot of TP.
-Hand soap: What our suite did was to bring two of the large refill containers, and one of the "Bathroom Sized" bottles. This way we were able to just refill the same container without having to completely replace it.
-Latex Gloves: These will be the first thing people reach for when they have to clean the bathroom. 




-Three Shower curtains: The shower itself has a bar, but does not have a curtain or rings. Use one set of rings and one curtain for the shower. When spring semester rolls around, change the curtain with the spare. The original one will be pretty nasty by the end of the first semester.
     -The second one will be used for a privacy curtain for the toilet. Hang the shower curtain from the tension bar to block the toilet from view. There is a example of this in the picture section below.
-Two (or more) sets of shower curtain rings: One will be used for the shower, one for the privacy screen. I had some friends who used their extra rings to hang up their ethernet cable in their room. It can't hurt to have extras.

-Shamwow: Yes, you will want to have a package of shamwows for the bathroom. The shower curtain sometimes won't block all of the water from going onto the floor. These reusable cloths are invaluable at cleaning up the resulting puddles.
-Plastic shoe mat with sides: We used this as a place to stand in after we got out of the shower. With this, we avoided tracking water across the floor and creating a massive puddle. Again, I have an example of this in the picture section.










Picture Section:


This is the standard sink in the Cromwell bathroom. There are two of these in each bathroom, with a cabinet beneath.  You can see the antibacterial wipes, the paper-towel stand, the hand soap, and the air freshener. 

The second picture of the sinks.

The privacy screen covering the toilet area.

This is the top of the shower area, along with the bar and the curtain.

Bottom of the shower, with the floor mat, and the Shamwow.

A lengthwise picture of the bathroom.

The toilet area.

These are the cleaners that we had in our bathroom. 
Babo scrubbing gel, Mildew cleaner, glass cleaner, disinfectant spray and wipes are on the right.

On the far right is the liquid hand soap refill container. Two of them should be fine for the whole year.

Additional cleaners.

This is the paper towel stand we had. These are very helpful, because it keeps your towels dry.

This is the bottle we refilled with the larger containers.







Of everyone I asked, nobody regretted having their own bathroom. Their benefits far outweigh the fact that you have to clean them.
And as a rule of thumb, trust your parent's suggestions about the bathroom. They probably have a lot more experience than we do when cleaning them.