1/4

Amid the real concern about impact of shifting education online for students, it is vital that we don't lose sight of the wider, longer term problems with the 'student experience.'

Loneliness among university students is not a COVID specific problem.

We've been interviewing students to learn more about their experience of online education through the pandemic.

One student captures this poignantly:

"I don't really have like a friend group within my department that I socialize with regularly."

2/4

Shifting online has created new challenges for supporting the social aspects of studying at university.

However, students have been struggling with loneliness for years.

This is possibly not a student specific problem - levels of loneliness are high among young adults.

3/4

I don't believe that simply getting students back on campus will be a silver bullet to fix loneliness.

We need to look at this shift online as an opportunity to think about new ways we can better support social connection between our students.

4/4