Five university icks that need to be avoided at the University of Birmingham

The University of Birmingham is famous for its beautiful buildings, incredible social life, and brilliant academic teaching. With thousands of students entering each year, the university enjoys a consistently positive reputation. 

However, with great reputation, comes also great distaste for certain behaviours or attributes of the institute.  

On our Instagram, we asked students at UoB about their biggest icks at the university, which ranged from certain buildings to behaviours of certain students.

People that don’t dress up on Sports Night

Sports Night is one of the biggest social events at UoB, occurring weekly every Wednesday. Sports societies, varying from BUCS football to social benchball, all host a fun pres followed by an exciting club night at the UoB Students’ Union.

Distinguishing between individuals is difficult on a normal club night, yet on a sports night to identify someone in your society simply find someone dressed similarly to  you.

Not dressing up not only offends the culture of the university, but undermines the effort of hundreds of weekly goers. Therefore, it is normalised to dress up, and dissenting from this norm is offensive and an ick.

People with zero spatial awareness at Selly Oak Aldi

The majority of students buy their alcohol, daily shopping and snacks at Selly Oak Aldi due to its cheap price and convenience. 

Everyone going into Aldi should know what they’re buying, and the sequential order of walking the shop should be automatic. 

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It is extremely inconvenient to stop in the middle of an aisle, with zero spatial awareness of other people. This creates not only an uncomfortable interaction for fellow students but could cause people get jump-scared or lead to spillages. This truly makes Birmingham University students piss boil. 

It is a massive ick to be that one inconvenience at Selly Oak Aldi, whereby the conduct of the store should come like second nature. If you are the person that keeps stopping near the bread and not moving, you are truly the worst person in Selly.

People that post Old Joe on their Instagram Story past semester one

Old Joe is an iconic landmark at UoB featuring on many Instagrams, being an aesthetic backdrop for almost any post. 

However, after walking past it everyday, taking pictures of it can get tiring and unoriginal. Scrolling past story after story of the same clock tower just taken in a different angle is tiring. I’ve had to unfollow the official University of Birmingham Instagram page for the amount of Old Joe photos that are plaguing my feed!

While letting this slide in semester one, by semester two people are bored of this trend. It is understandable in the first semester to showcase Old Joe to home friends on Instagram, yet to fellow UoB students, this is a tourist move with a lack of sentiment. 

People that take deep lunges when using the Teaching and Learning stairs

@thetab_birmingham

Going for the found footage shakey cam aesthetic with this one #studentlife #student #sellyoak #oldjoe #universityofbirmingham #uob #westmidlands #birmingham #teachingandlearning

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Teaching and Learning Building (TLB) is paraded as one of the most legendary buildings at UoB, being a wonderful alternative to the library, yet it contains one major flaw being the stairs that accompany it. 

The Teaching and Learning Building’s stairs are extra wide and long, making the journey of going up and down embarrassing for many.

Some people use these stairs as a form of daily exercise, doing deep lunges when going up and down the stairs. This slows down people behind them and is particularly an inconvenient place to do daily exercise. 

Using these stairs is a chore already, any further hassle could ruin someone’s day, thus this is a major ick at UoB. 

People that hold up Sports and Fitness equipment without actually exercising

Sports and Fitness holds a brilliant gym facility for anyone looking to get active at UoB. However, the equipment is busy and full at most parts of the day. 

Waiting for equipment is a norm at the gym, and thus members should respect doing exercises in a reasonable time slot. 

While exercise may not be for everyone, the gym should be a place to exercise and do the workouts you need. Certain individuals that simply sit on equipment without using it for a long period of time cause major annoyance for fellow gym members. The unspoken rule at sport and fitness states that while all equipment is busy, you can’t be doom scrolling on TikTok or Instagram. Yes, I’ve just made this rule up on the spot.

This is a major ick as not only are you not using the facilities for the right purpose but are causing huge inconvenience and delay for people that actually want to work out.