Medway-Sydenham Hall
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Medway-Sydenham Hall (also referred to as Med-Syd or MSH) is a co-ed residence at the University of Western Ontario (UWO). It is the third largest residence on campus, home to about 613 students. It is also the oldest residence still operating on campus.
History
Medway Hall was built in 1958 as an all male residence. Sydenham Hall was built in 1961 as an all male residence. Both buildings operated as separate all male residences and were bitter rivals until 1986. In 1986, Sydenham Hall was converted to an all female residence as Medway Hall remained all male. Both halls remained single gender until 1997 when Medway Hall and Sydenham Hall both went co-ed and joined under the title Medway Sydenham Hall. Medway Sydenham Hall has made great progress since 1997 and is regularly recognized as one of the strongest residence communities on campus and home to the most successful and productive Resident's Council; The Medway Sydenham Hall Residents' Council.
Building layout
Medway-Sydenham consists of two separate residences that are connected through a tunnel. Both Medway and Sydenham are three stories high and contains only stairs and no elevators.
Medway
Medway contains a total of nine floors, all 3 floors per three units. The fourth unit in Medway is made up of the Thomas L. Hoskin Library (also known as the Medlib), the Formal Lounge (also known as the Flounj) and the Green Room (formerly the Medway Lounge). The four units are positioned in a rectangular shape, forming a Quad in the center.
* Unit: WPM --- Floors: Murphy, Peache, Wilson
* Unit: MGM --- Floors: Gibbons, McKibben, Meredith
* Unit: BED --- Floors: Beattie, Drury, Eccles
The word floor is more associated with the names than with actually landings of a building. The floors of the third floor (Eccles, Meredith and Wilson) are connected by the hallway as are the floors of the second floor (Drury, McKibben and Peache). Although they are connected by the hallway, they are considered to be of distinct groups. In the past, they were separated by doors that were kept closed and locked.
Sydenham
The Sydenham building design is very similar to Medway's. It has a total of 9 floors within 3 units. The fourth section in Sydenham consists of the Cafeteria and the Sydenham Lounge. Unlike Medway, Sydenham's 3 units are named as a whole. Similar to the first floor of Medway, none of the units floors are connected directly to each other. They are only connected by the underground tunnel system.
* Unit: Spencely Tamblyn (ST) --- Floors: ST-1, ST-2, ST-3
* Unit: James Neville (JN) --- Floors: JN-1, JN-2, JN-3
* Unit: Crane Ingram (CI) --- Floors: CI-1, CI-2, CI-3
Vixens
The Medway Sydenham Hall Vixens are an all female flag football team made up of the female residents of Medway Sydenham Hall, along with several student coaches. The Vixens compete in two campus wide tournaments annually: Brescia Bowl and Champions Cup. The Vixens won both of these tournaments in the 03/04, 04/05, 06/07, 07/08, and 09/10 seasons. In 08/09, The Vixens won the Brescia Bowl and lost in the finals in the Champions Cup. The Vixens continued the dynasty, by capturing both the Brescia Bowl & Champions Cup again in 09/10. As of the 15/16 season, the Vixens have won Brescia Bowl sixteen years in a row.
The Medway Sydenham Hall Vixens are consistently known as the largest team in the tournament—often bringing over 100 girls to compete.
Sophs
Every year the soph team is selected through an interview process. Medway Sydenham regularly has the most applications per capita compared to all other UWO residences.
The team consists of a total of 38 Sophs, one being the Head Soph. There are two sophs per floor, usually one female and one male per floor, but is dependent on team size and gender balance. One exception is that Gibbons, contains a maximum of 4 sophs. Both sophs on the all-girls floor are female.
"FIRE IT UP!" is a mantra commonly heard among Med-Syd sophs and residents.
Staff
The staff team consists of 23 people. Each unit has 3 staff members (except Gibbons), 1 per floor, and there is a don on the first floor of every unit. The only exception is that in the JN unit the don is on the second floor (JN-2). Gibbons has a total of 2 staff members, one don and one RA.
Members of the staff team that are not Dons or RAs include the residence manager, the Academics and Leadership Programmer (ALP) and the Assistant Program Coordinator (APC). The residence manager has a suite style room in Medway.
Residents' Council
The Medway Sydenham Hall Residents' Council is the governing student organization of Medway Sydenham Hall. The Medway Sydenham Hall Residents' Council's mission statement is captured in the Preamble of its Constitution:
The Medway Sydenham Hall Residents’ Council exists as a representative body of the students who make up the Medway Sydenham Hall community. Our purpose shall be to represent, advance and defend the interests of our membership, while enhancing our residence and academic experience, through the highest standards and quality of life. In order to do so, the Medway Sydenham Hall Residents’ Council recognizes its important partnership with the University Students’ Council, the Division of Housing and Ancillary Services, and the University of Western Ontario. While the Medway Sydenham Hall Residents’ Council will make every effort to support the vision and mission of its partners through cooperation and collaboration, its primary responsibility will be to uphold and defend the interests of its constituents.[1]
Medway and Sydenham Halls both had their own independent Residents' Councils formed in 1958 and 1961 respectively. When the buildings joined in 1997, so did their Councils to form the Medway and Sydenham Hall Residents' Council. This name was officially changed to the Medway Sydenham Hall Residents' Council in 2004.
The Medway Sydenham Hall Residents' Council traditionally meets weekly on Sunday evenings at 8:30pm in the Thomas L. Hoskin Medway Library. The Council is the most productive Residents' Council on campus with a reported gross cash flow of $100,000 for the 2007-2008 academic year, a record year.
The current Medway Sydenham Hall Residents' Council is made up of 3 branches:
1) The Executive Branch is made up of the elected President, Vice President Social and Vice President Finance.
2) The Upper House is made up the Executive Branch as well as appointed Committee Heads (Academic, Athletic, Cultural and Environmental, Human Issues, Newsletter, Philanthropy, Promotions, Social, Yearbook and Head Soph), Representative Members (Housing Operations Commissioner (HOC) and University Students' Council Representative) and Internal Officers (Communications Officer).
3) The Lower House (or full Council) is made up of the Upper House as well as 1 Floor Representative from each floor, 1 Residence Life Staff Liaison, 1 Faculty Representative from all Faculty Councils that request one, 1 Academic Programs Coordinator(APC) and the Residence Manager.