Emily’s Blog

A quick, sad goodbye

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Hi friends,

Unfortunately with COVID-19 becoming more serious and as new knowledge comes to light and as Ohio State takes many precautionary measures, I was asked to leave Westminster early. I am incredibly sad that my time was cut short, but I am happy to do whatever is safest for everyone. I apologize for not being able to say goodbye properly. I want to thank everyone at Westminster for welcoming me with open arms into the community. I had an incredible experience living at Westminster over the last nine months. I enjoyed learning from and listening to all the residents that I met. This program was a great privilege to learn from amazing individuals and be part of an inclusive community. I am excited to take everything that I learned to my new job after graduation in May. I will be working in Clinton County, Ohio as a county planner working with older adults among many other tasks. I will cherish my memories made at Westminster, and I cannot wait to come back and visit when all this passes us. Until then, stay safe everyone and if anyone wants to email or call to keep in touch, please let me know! My email is emilyylongg@gmail.com. Thank you all for being absolutely wonderful neighbors!

Here is a picture of my last sunrise in apartment 912! ❤️

My next project: Signs

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I am so happy to see more residents are visiting my blog and commenting. I love it! This past Monday I had lunch with about 7 residents in The Crossings. It was really nice to chat about things going on with me, the residents, and notable events happening at Westminster. We talked about my acoustics report for The Crossings, and possibilities for my next project.

I am looking into improving wayfinding and signage around Westminster’s campus. With so many buildings, addresses and entrances, it can become confusing on where to go. When visitors come, especially during busy times like OWLs, it seems that people are always asking where is this, how do I get to that, etc. So, I’m hoping to record the current signage and propose easier to read signage, better locations for these signs, and maybe a few new locations for directions. I’m really interested on hearing what residents have to say about the wayfinding through the entire campus. Please let me know if you have any ideas on how to improve our direction signage!

Lunches with me!

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Life can be busy! One thing I have noticed at Westminster is that residents are busy with meetings, events, and traveling. There is no doubt that my schedule can be tricky too with work, school, and all my other extracurriculars. It is for this reason, that I’m asking residents to take a pause on a couple of Mondays for the semester to come eat lunch with me in The Crossings. There is no particular topic in mind to discuss, just looking for some company over the lunch hour to start the week off right!
The following dates I’ll be waiting in The Crossings for you to come join me! 🙂
Monday, Feb 17th at Noon
Monday, March 23 at Noon
Monday, April 20th at Noon

I’m back! With a report in hand!

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Hi everyone!

After a long holiday break at home, and wild start to my spring semester, I’m finally getting back into a routine. I was able to spend 3 weeks during my last academic holiday break at home with my family. As always, I love spending time with my parents and it was great to relax at the end of 2019. I started this semester participating in a two week long design competition through the Urban Land Institute. A team of students and I reimagined a six block piece of land in Miami, Florida. This included everything from building form to finances to roadway infrastructure. It was exhausting but so much fun! All that being said, I’m getting back into my normal routine!!

Before the holidays, I finished my project on The Crossings. I was able to package together a report on how to better improve acoustics in The Crossings. I heard from experience experts, residents and from acoustical experts about the issue. It was really an interesting, investigative experience for me. If you click on the link below, you can see the full report!

Acoustics Report: The Crossings

A great week!

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The past two weeks have been amazing at Westminster. Everyone has been really supportive as my semester is coming to a close. One of the residents, Mark, introduced me to a few of his friends in the other parts of the campus! It was really nice to be shown around and met a couple new friendly faces. I also attended a social hour on my floor. Each floor of Thurber Tower has a common room outside the elevators, this turned out to be a perfect spot for a floor gathering. I’m really appreciative of all the goodies provided and the support given before a big presentation at school!

A mini tour

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Ohio Living Westminster Thurber is absolutely beautiful, so I wanted to share a few photos with you about my day to day views! I live in an amazing studio apartment on the ninth floor of Thurber Tower. Despite the noise of traffic, I consider myself lucky because my balcony faces downtown! If you were curious about what my apartment looks like and my balcony view, check out my photos below!

Sunrise

Night view

Some of my own and collected artwork in my apartment!

Here is a view of the inside of my studio apartment, excuse any messes!

I’m already decorated for the holidays!

A little more about me!

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I wanted to take this blog post to show you a little bit more about myself! I am originally from Maria Stein, Ohio but moved to Columbus about 5 years ago. My parents still live in the area, but my brother, sister-in-law, and my niece, Izzy, live just up the road in Worthington. I am a people person and love spending time with family and friends. My boyfriend, Hunter, and I have been together almost two years and we both are in our masters program together for city and regional planning. We really enjoy traveling and have been on two study abroad programs together, one of which we met! My life is pretty busy right now with my internship, school, student activities, and being the Student In Residence. Though if you ask anyone close to me, I do like being busy! I also love painting, camping, cooking, and keeping up with the news. Below are some photos of friends, family, and me. I couldn’t upload a ton of photos, but there are many other people important to me that I would include too!

Here are my parents cheering me on at the half marathon!

My cousins have been with me through everything, we are definitely a close knit group of women!

My beautiful, cute niece, Izzy!

Recently, my friends, Noelle and Allison, visited our friend Gianna in Denver!

This picture is from the first time I studied abroad and met some lifelong friends, Evan and Kevin, and my boyfriend, Hunter!

Speed bumps!

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Since, I’m a city planning student— the process behind making things happen is extremely fascinating to me. I’m slowly learning the structures here at Westminster. And there is a lot going on! There are many meetings, events, games, and activities happening on any given day and the residents are involved. People come to these events and participate. This past week, my family, friends, and I attended the Fall Festival out in the parking lot. We enjoyed music, company, and good food. But, there isn’t just social events that happen at Westminster. I’ve attended a resident association meeting and have recently learned about several committees that meet on a regular basis that discuss improving quality of life for residents based on different subject matter.

One of these committees is the building committee. The building committee works on projects around campus that improves physical spaces. I had the opportunity to meet with Bill from the committee this past week to hear what the team is working on. Among other things, the new speed bumps outside in the parking lot have been an issue for residents. They are abrupt and a little unpleasant and uncomfortable to drive over. However, they were installed to slow traffic and protect residents and visitors to increase safety. The building committee is thinking about the speed bumps, listening to resident opinions on how well they work, and discussing additional ways for safety. It has been interesting to learn about how the structures at Westminster operate with resident and staff representation on various committees to help improve the overall experience here.

A new student has moved in!

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Hi everyone!

My name is Emily Long, and I am the second and current Student In Residence at Westminster. I wanted to tell you all a little bit about myself and the purpose of this blog!

I’m a second year graduate student at Ohio State studying City and Regional Planning in the Knowlton School of Architecture. I’ve lived in Columbus for 5 years now, and I’ve known the amazing people with Age-Friendly Columbus and Franklin County for almost just as long. When the Student In Residence program launched last year, I have to say I had a few reservations. I had never heard of a twenty-something person living in an independent living community. Would residents want a student living with them? Would they be interested in talking with me? I receive a lot of questions from other people too when I tell them where I live. It is a bit different, the program is unique. I’m a twenty-four year old living in an older adult independent living apartment. But, I absolutely love it. I have been welcomed over the past couple weeks with open arms and warm conversations.

Moving days are stressful. Being a transient college student, I have had one too many moving days from apartment to apartment. In addition, moving up to the ninth floor of Thurber Tower in an elevator presented a new set of challenges. With an entire day of moving out of my old apartment and into Thurber Tower, I was stressed, tired, and a little out of my comfort zone. But as I picked up my keys at the front desk at Westminster and headed back outside to unload. I heard one of the residents say, “welcome home.” It hit me. This living program places me in a community. I live with people who care about me, slip notes under my door, and always ask how my classes and day are going. It is a wonderful feeling, a sense of community and belonging.

I cannot wait to continue this experience and learn from the residents here at Westminster. Please check in with me at this website to hear more about my experience!

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