Something I was working on, pre-maternity leave, is the history of the idea of the “student experience” - in so far as it comes up in discussions of student anxiety and stress - and I can’t wait to get back to it

Because the way it’s invoked by the Office for Students, and by students themselves around Covid, online teaching, self isolation and debt, is so remarkable at the moment

Students aren’t questioning fees because we, their lecturers, haven’t done enough. So the academy’s defensiveness is misplaced. What they feel robbed of is an idea of studenthood, and that idea isn’t about the delivery or contents of their modules

So now, more than ever, we need to know how, why and when this idea of student experience came into play, and to unpick its relationship to funding models

Because I think this is something to hold onto: their disappointment is not about you, and no mode of delivery - face to face or remote - will really lessen their sense of loss. It’s about an idea about this time in their lives. All you can do is teach, guide, and be honest.

This is a part of my bigger project examining their history of student mental health - the first article is here https://academic.oup.com/jhmas/article-abstract/75/2/193/5698287?redirectedFrom=fulltext