Colleges of the University of Otago

The majority of first year students at the University of Otago's Dunedin campus stay in one of the fourteen residential colleges, alongside a smaller number of senior students and postgraduates. These colleges provide food, accommodation, social and welfare services, as well as some degree of additional academic support, particularly for the largest papers.

The colleges, many of which were formerly known as Halls of Residence, have a long-standing presence within the Dunedin academic society; the earliest was founded in 1893, only 24 years after the university's establishment. Since then, they have become contributing factors to the university's character and, with a combined capacity of over 3000 students, they contribute substantially to the university's provision of accommodation for new members from outside the city. While most of the colleges are university owned, three are owned by Presbyterian Church and one by the Anglican Church and two are co-institutional, accommodating students of Otago Polytechnic, as well as those of the university.

In addition, the University of Otago College of Education, founded in 1876 as the Dunedin College of Education, has acted as an education faculty for the university since a merger in 2007, though it differs in function and purpose from the residential colleges described below.

<!--== History == By 1874, the need to provide residence for 'professors and students' of the new university in Dunedin became clear. However, even outside of the city, it was almost thirty years later when the University of New Zealand Senate, the governing body of Otago and the other university centres at the time, made their first substantial request for government support for such a development in New Zealand. It was to be 1915, before the first university-established house was to appear in Dunedin, Studholme House.

In the intervening period, the problems of accommodation shortage and quality were tempered by the establishment of three independent colleges, Selwyn College in 1893, Knox College in 1909 and St Margaret's College in 1911, by the Anglican and Presbyterian churches. Though the former two began life as theological colleges, they have included general university students from their inception and long-term residents are now, generally, members of the university. Independent college tuition was taking place in non-theological subjects, such as medicine, by the 1920s. By the 1950s, St Margaret's was being described as the "largest and best equipped women's hall in the country".

Not long after St Margaret's opened, the School of Home Science founded Studholme House in 1911; until this point, students of the School had occasionally been housed in the departmental chair's own house and a permanent solution, as well as provision for college-based teaching, was required.

It was much later that the next colleges came into being, through the work of an interdenominational group which became known as the Stuart Residence Halls Council. To begin with, a small hostel was established, Stuart House, for students of the teachers' training college. The university, Education Board and the Council then started to look at options for combined training college and university residences, eventually founding Carrington Hall in 1941, into which Stuart House was absorbed, and Arana Hall in 1943. Carrington became the first co-educational hall in New Zealand. While the university owned Arana and the Education Board owned Carrington, both were administered by the Council on their behalf. At their founding, Arana provided for 27 residents and Carrington for 22; at this point, only Knox had provided more rooms on its opening, with 42. By 1953, Arana's size had trebled and Carrington's had quadrupled to over a hundred.

The subsequent college foundation was that of a women's residence, Dominican Hall, in 1946 as an initiative of the Roman Catholic church. This was soon followed by Aquinas Hall in 1954, also through the Dominican order, though neither required students to be of any particular denomination. While Dominican Hall eventually closed, Aquinas was later bought by the university and has survived to present day.-->

Nature of the colleges
The most central halls, situated beside the university's oldest buildings, are St Margaret's College, noted for a strong academic lean, and University College (Unicol), which is the largest college, housing approximately 550 residents during the academic year. The colleges can exhibit distinctive features: Aquinas College, being amongst the smallest and farthest from the university centre, has developed a "family-like and informal atmosphere". Toroa College, formerly an international house, was almost exclusively filled by international students during this period, developing an environment with social and support aspects tailored to those special needs.

The residential colleges select students based on their marks, extracurricular activities and high school testimonials, with some colleges having application to place ratios of over 3:1. Applicants may list several colleges in their application, in case they are not selected by their first preference.

While many of the colleges only accept residents for a single year, a few do have a sizable proportion of second year returners. At some colleges, for instance Selwyn College and Knox College, the majority of new entrants stay for two or more years. The Chris Burks Memorial Bursary is awarded to a second year student resident at Carrington College. All of the colleges consist of a majority undergraduate population.

Otago's colleges are not as significant in the life of the University as those of the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. Similarly to colleges at those universities, some Otago colleges have a Master, fellows, a chapel and/or regular formal meals but, unlike Oxford and Cambridge colleges, students' primary affiliation is to the university rather than to the college and it is normal for only a small percentage, if any, of an Otago student's teaching to take place in their college.

College ownership
While the majority of the residential colleges are owned by the University, they each have their own internal management structures and College Council.

Churches established the first colleges at the university, Selwyn (1893), Knox (1909) and St. Margaret's (1911). Studholme (1915) is the oldest University-owned College. Four colleges continue to be owned by churches and are governed entirely independently from the University. These are Selwyn College, Knox College, St Margaret's College, and Salmond College.

Intercollegiate activities
A number of intercollegiate competitions are held, though often between pairs or subsets of the colleges. According to the university's prospectus, all colleges other than Toroa College have some inter-collegiate activities. Regular competitions include: An intercollegiate rowing competition was held in May 2010 which Unicol are the current holders of. An intercollegiate basketball competition was held over August/September and the respective champions were Arana (mixed), Cumberland (girls) & Aquinas College (boys).
 * Southgate Trophy and Iona Trophy between Studholme College, St Margaret's College and Salmond College
 * Cameron Shield and Nevill Cup between Selwyn College and Knox College
 * AC/HC Shield between Hayward College and Aquinas College
 * Stuart Shield between Carrington College and Arana College

List of residential colleges
The university maintains an online list.

Descriptions of the colleges
A number of colleges have their own articles: Caroline Freeman College, Selwyn College, Knox College, St Margaret's College, Studholme College, Arana College, Carrington College, Aquinas College, University College, Salmond College, and Cumberland College.

From the founding of the first college, Selwyn College, in 1893, to the most recent, Te Rangi Hiroa College, in 2014, the architecture, motivations, expectations and models for residential colleges in Dunedin have changed substantially. None of the earliest three colleges were owned by the university, despite this being the case for the vast majority of later colleges, and a significant fraction were originally single-sex (including all but one of the affiliated colleges and several university-owned colleges) whereas all colleges are now co-educational. As such, the residential colleges represent a wide range of buildings, compositions and ethoses.

Toroa College
Toroa College was opened by the university in 1996 as Toroa International House to cater for growing numbers of overseas students. It was the first residential college to offer self-catering accommodation. Since then, it has become Toroa College and has opened access to domestic students. The college takes an active approach to environmental issues and has an environmental committee charged with encouraging sustainable living in the residential college context.

Abbey College
Abbey College was a postgraduate residential college at the University of Otago from 2008 to 2020. It was founded in 2008 to meet the needs of the university's growing graduate and postgraduate population. The college had a range of facilities developed for the hotel/motel previously occupying the complex, such as a swimming pool and sauna.

It had a strong international representation with two-thirds of members from outside New Zealand. The first Head of College was Gretchen Kivell (February 2008 - June 2013) followed by Dr Charles Tustin (July 2013 to November 2016).

Abbey College was closed in 2020. In 2021, the building was used as a wing of nearby Caroline Freeman College.