Cambridge college advertise for new housekeepers amid cleaning scandal

Fitz has posted job listings for new housekeeping staff following uproar after cleaners distributed pictures of students’ messy bedrooms

6 months ago

Sophie Petrie | News

In the wake of Fitzwilliam’s accommodation scandal, The Independent have noted that the college has quickly started advertising for new cleaners.

The original incident, in which cleaners mass distributed pictures of students’ messy bedrooms and kitchens without their consent via the college mailing list, was described as “a whole new level of evil” by one Camfess user, and a “massive invasion of privacy” by an affected student.

Image credit: author’s own screenshot via Camfess

The college has insisted they are taking steps to ensure it doesn’t happen again:

“The inclusion of the image of a student room was unacceptable and the College has issued an apology to the student and recalled the email. Steps have been taken with immediate effect to ensure that this does not happen again.”

The college describe the bedroom as “unidentified”, but one affected student said “everyone knew it was my kitchen, so I was near enough named and shamed to the entire college”.

The incident occurred on Wednesday the 17th April, with Varsity breaking the story on Tuesday 23rd April. Job listings appeared on Indeed for ‘Casual Housekeeper’ and ‘Housekeeping Supervisor’ on Tuesday 23rd and Wednesday 24th April respectively.

Fitzwilliam college has denied any connection between the new job listings and the incident.

“The College confirms that there is no connection whatsoever between the recruitment underway in Housekeeping and the email sent to students last week.

“The advertisement for a Housekeeping supervisor is due to the upcoming retirement of a long-serving staff member of the Housekeeping team, and the College has been engaged in a rolling recruitment for casual Housekeepers since 2022.”

Feature image credit: Pollyanna Beatrice Rowland