Study and co-working spaces
Are you looking for a quiet place to study, with or without a computer? Or do you need a place to work together with fellow students?
Three types
There are three types of individual study space:
- Study spaces that you must always reserve. These generally have a computer and can be recognised by the dark blue sticker.
- Study spaces that you only need to reserve during exam periods. You can recognise these from the light blue sticker.
- Study spaces that you never need to reserve, even during exam periods. You can recognise these from the white sticker.
Exam periods
Exam periods are periods of several weeks during which demand for study spaces is highest. During exam periods you must always reserve light blue study spaces.
When are exam periods?
- October 7th, 2024 - October 27th, 2024
- December 2th, 2024 - January, 26th 2025
- March 3th, 2025 - March 23th, 2025
- May 12th, 2025 - June 29th, 2025
Exam periods are determined by the demand for study spaces within the whole university. However, some study programmes may hold exams in other periods.
Reservation and check-in
Reserving an individual study space
- You can reserve a study space two days in advance.
- Go to the SharedDesk environment and log in with your ULCN details. Use Chrome, Safari or Firefox.
- You will see an overview of study locations, listed in order of available spaces. Select a location, date and time.
- Click on a green study space and confirm your reservation.
- You can check the details of your reservation by clicking on the 'My reservations' tab in SharedDesk.
- You can find the number of each study space on the desk itself.
Check-in
You must first check in before you can use your reserved study space.
- At the University Library and Law Library you can check in by scanning your LU card.
- At all other locations you must scan a QR code on the check-in poles.
- You can check in max. 15 minutes before your reserved time slot.
- Make sure you stay checked in for at least the first 30 minutes of your time slot, otherwise your reservation will be cancelled.
- If you temporarily check out during your time slot, you must check back in within 45 minutes otherwise your reservation will be cancelled.
Check in on time or your reservation will be cancelled
If you have not checked in maximum 30 minutes after your reserved start time, your reservation will be cancelled so that someone else can make use of the space.
In every faculty building you can reserve co-working spaces in free classrooms. Here you can work, meet and study with groups of four or more students.
Reserving co-working study spaces
- Go to the Mapiq environment and log in with your ULCN account.
- Select a location.
- Select ‘Find a classroom’ in the right-hand menu, or navigate to the classroom you want on the map.
- Select a date and time then confirm your reservation.
Rules
- You may only reserve on the day itself.
- Co-working spaces are available between 09.00 and 17.00.
- Co-working spaces are intended for groups of four or more students. One student must reserve on behalf of the whole group.
- One reservation is for a maximum duration of 120 minutes.
- If lessons will be given in the classroom right after you finish, the lecturer may ask you to leave the room 15 minutes before the lesson commences.
- You do not need to check in (unlike individual study spaces).
- If you move tables and chairs, please put them back again.
Reserving group study rooms in libraries
You can also book group study rooms in some of the university libraries.
365 student work spaces
The Pieter de la Court Building offers a total of 365 student computers. Availability can be checked on the work places website.
Room for groups (S.A37)
Need to work on a group assignment? Want to practice your presentation with a fellow student? Lecture room S.A37 is equipped with five extra screens and whiteboards if you want to work on a project together. As long as the room isn’t reserved, students are welcome to use these facilities.
Editing room (1.A45)
In the editing room you can edit video footage, audio and photographs. You can use it for example for adding soundtracks and/or subtitles, making clips from longer video sequences, pasting fragments together and cropping photographs. It’s also easy to convert video files to a new file format.
Reserve a computer in the editing room
Software available
The Adobe CC 2018 software package is installed on all computers in the editing room. This package works with a personal account. Creating a free Adobe account is necessary to use this software. Adobe CC 2018 contains the following software among others:
- Adobe Premiere Pro used for editing and exporting videos;
- Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom used for editing images and photographs;
- Adobe Audition used for editing audio material;
- Adobe Media Encoder used for converting video files to a different format. Media Encoder is also installed on any other Leiden University working station. See the manual here below for further instructions.
Practical information
- The editing room is open from 9:00h until the Pieter de la Court Building closes.
- Headphones may be borrowed at SOLO, room 1B11
Manuals and tutorials
- Adobe Media Encoder - Converting videos to a different format (NL)
- Adobe Media Encoder Learn & Support
- Adobe Premiere Pro Learn & Support
- Adobe Photoshop Learn & Support
- Adobe Audition Learn & Support