The data are based on the answers of 502 students (thank you for responding in such large numbers!) and all differences mentioned below are significant (which means, they're not a coincidence).

Who filled out the survey?

In total, 502 respondents have filled out the survey, of which 31% first-year students, 39% 2nd-years, and 30% 3rd years. Of all respondents, 48% has a Dutch nationality (the rest non-Dutch) and 73% identifies as female, 26% as male, and 0,6% as another gender.

Of the respondents, 82% currently live in the Netherlands; this number is lower for non-Dutch students (we’ll call them international students from now on), of whom 69% live in the Netherlands. Dutch students live with their parents more often, while international students more often live with roommates. Less than half of the respondents report to be satisfied with their physical study environment, with first-year students being more satisfied than third-year students. Social contacts are mostly found with family (51%), friends (37%), roommates (31%), and students from courses (21%). 

A general sense

In general, the expressed feelings students reported having felt during the fall semester did not come as a surprise. Almost two-third of students indicate to be frustrated with things in life (almost) all the time. Not beneficent towards this is the experienced study/life balance; 41% of students does not feel good about this balance (almost) all the time. Fortunately, many students (75%) did feel resilient during the past semester. This resilience is very much needed in periods where stress can take overhand.  

Overwhelming majority

There are some issues in which most students give similar answers. First and foremost, 81% of the respondents indicates that the corona crisis has had a negative impact on their study motivation. Almost two-thirds have felt stressed due to online teaching methods (63%). Also, most students think language classes should get priority over other courses when it comes to on-campus education. Only 56% indicates they would like to follow on-campus lectures, which shows that many students are fine with online lectures, more so than with online tutorials and language classes. 

Also, a large majority of the students (86%) is satisfied, or at least not dissatisfied with the way the International Studies Programme handled the corona crisis. However, almost half of the students indicate that they do not feel part of the International Studies community. This is understandable under the current circumstances and it is hard to re-create a community online. Even the on-campus ‘hot cocoa’-moment in December attracted only about 30 – 40 students, which shows the complex nature of this: it may very well be due to lack of community feel, that students don’t feel enough incentive to go to activities (and form that community).

Striking differences

In general, female students appear to be struggling more than male students. Female students report higher levels of frustration and depression, find less joy in life, and feel worse about their exercise levels. Male students report higher levels of calmness and resilience. Some metrics on which female students score better than male students are their satisfaction with the way they handle alcohol/drugs and reading their University e-mail (we are not sure whether the two are related, but there may be a connection).

Another finding is that third-year students have a more difficult time compared to first-year students. It is a well-known fact that third-year students feel more stress as they are approaching their graduation, but the corona crisis is certainly not helping. Third-year students report having more trouble sleeping, more restlessness, and are less prone to talk to a member of University staff. Incidentally, Dutch students also feel more free to approach a member of staff compared to internationals.
One clear finding for the second year students is that they’re most concerned about workload, which is something we had noticed ourselves as well. For the second semester, we are consciously working on keeping the number of tutorial assignments lower.

And now?

Much of this information adds to our consciousness of how you, students, experience these times and it helps to put our choices and initiatives into perspective. Some concrete ideas mentioned by you have truly inspired us for the second semester.

As International Studies teaching and support staff, we often feel the same as our students do. Online meetings are not half as fun as on-campus meetings and online teaching only vaguely resembles normal teaching. At the same time, we are committed to keep organizing opportunities for connecting, be it through online meetings, pub quizzes, or platforms such as Discord, or through on-campus events, including on-campus teaching. These activities may not be the same as they were before, but it still is better than just sitting this out. We are convinced that we will get through these difficult times and we await the moment in which we will all be reunited!