A new campaign is challenging colleges to prioritise student life and well-being.

‘Whose University?’, an independent campaign supported by CUSU Women’s Campaign, asks whether colleges are too business-minded in renting out college space to conference guests at the expense of student well-being.

The campaign Facebook group encourages testimonies from students of times “when colleges and the university fail to prioritise students” and asks whether students feel they have any non-legal “ownership” of their room, “in the sense of who has the right to feel at home in these spaces”.

Daisy Hughes, the organiser of the campaign, said that the idea came “out of many conversations people have been having recently about students feeling marginalised in their own colleges”, but was triggered by a point in a recent Women’s Forum about how being forced to vacate their rooms could leave students unable to access services such as the University Counselling Service.

One aim of the campaign to help the “university and colleges to realise that the idea of a ‘home’ to return to each vacation is not a privilege that everyone here is able to access.”

Circumstances that could necessitate a student to stay at college include access to libraries to complete vacation work and continued access to mental or physical health care established during the term

The campaign is also aware that the parents and guardians of many students are unable to pick them up with all of their belongings on the specified travel day so that colleges can then rent out rooms to conference guests.

The campaign also adds that “not everyone can or wants to go home” and stresses that these issues are “directly affected” by factors such as class, race, gender and disability.

She said that the campaign aims to “hold [colleges] accountable for the marginalisation of students that we feel is taking place … hopefully then we can move onto pushing for some change.”

The university website states that "all undergraduates are guaranteed accommodation by their Cambridge College for at least three years", and that colleges are "committed" to ensuring that students who have previously been in care have accommodation available throughout the year. 

A spokesperson for the university said: "Cambridge Colleges are registered charities which prioritise teaching, learning and research. Supporting those priorities involves a combination of fundraising and conference activities which means facilities used by students in term time are also made available for other purposes during the rest of the year. Colleges must decide individually where the balance lies."