Helpful insights and information about student and youth marketing

Getting the Green Light – What’s Up With Everyone?

It’s mental health awareness week and The Student Room has been promoting What’s Up With Everyone? – a campaign with young people for young people to help build up stronger ways of dealing with life’s challenges. The campaign offers a number of practical tools for their journey through school, college, university and the workplace. It focuses on key challenges of loneliness and isolation, perfectionism, competitiveness, independence and harm from social media. Each challenge is taken up by five brilliant new Aardman characters—Merve, Charlie, Tai, Ashley and Alex.

What do students want from virtual open days?

After enduring over a year of lockdown restrictions, the majority of Year 13s starting university in September have never visited a campus.

It looks likely that in-person events will resume this summer; however, we predict that virtual events will continue to play a key role in applicants’ decision-making journeys.

So what do applicants want from virtual open days this year?

Protecting young people online: The Student Room teams up with three national mental health charities

The Student Room is working with Samaritans, Student Minds and Papyrus to improve mental health signposting for students on our …

What have we learnt for Clearing this year? Brand awareness is key

With continued uncertainty around grading this summer, Clearing 2021 could be the biggest we’ve seen. In this blog, we’ll look at a mixture of quantitative student data (polls, market research and onsite behaviour) and qualitative data (student comments) to give you a holistic view of what to expect this year.

We’ll also include key brand building strategies based on these learnings to help your university prepare for a successful Clearing cycle.

What motivates students to choose your university?

We know that you are thinking about Clearing already, but understanding why this year’s students have accepted or rejected your offers will give you a powerful edge in predicting and influencing future applicant choices.

In this blog, we will cover how to access and use 2021 entry applicant insights to make strategic decisions about your upcoming student recruitment campaigns.

Covid-19 and demand for postgraduate courses

History tells us that when the economy goes down, postgraduate applications go up. After the 2008 financial crisis, postgraduate student numbers grew by an average of 4.4% per cycle between 2007/8 and 2010/11 (HESA). Between the 2011/12 to 2019/20 cycles numbers adjusted back down, then returned to a trend growth rate of around 2% a year. So can we expect a surge in postgraduate applications in our current economic climate? This blog will look at some of the key factors affecting postgraduate demand, postgraduate funding and the competitor landscape, reasons that applicants are drawn to postgraduate study, and the trends we are seeing in students’ postgraduate course and career choices.

Studying From Home: when the honeymoon period is over

Latest Government announcements have given no clear indication as to when students will be back on campus in the UK. We’ve continued to investigate the impact of home studying and online learning, and what this means for students’ productivity and mental wellbeing.

The impact of lockdown measures on students in 2021

As we head into the second month of 2021, we’re mindful that students have been in and out of lockdowns for almost a year.

Covid-19 has impacted every aspect of their learning, social lives and futures, and record numbers are seeking support on The Student Room.

So what do young people think about how their education is being handled? We’ve been keeping a close eye on student behaviour and sentiment throughout January to find out.*

The financial fallout of covid-19 and what it means for your student recruitment

Nearly half of students are currently experiencing financial difficulties due to Covid-19, according to our latest poll.

The poll also revealed significant inequality in what students are experiencing, as over 13% said they have better financial opportunities as a result of the pandemic.

We’ve taken a look at some of the comments on The Student Room to find out how covid-19 is impacting young people financially today. We found three key themes across those who are struggling: graduate careers, accommodation, and finding part-time work while studying.

What students think about apprenticeship schemes

An increasing number of students are seeing the benefits of apprenticeships. Read our insights about youth apprentices.

Christmas video 2020 from The Student Room

A special Christmas video message – Thank you from The Student Room

Marcus (CEO), Amii (Commercial Operations Director) and Paul (Sales Director) have a message for you on behalf of Team TSR.

Student sentiment in 2020: insights and engagement strategies

More than ever before, students are looking to leaders and the government to solve the unprecedented challenges they are facing. Thanks to covid-19, their education and exams have been disrupted, their social lives have been all but shut-down at a time when they might have been forming life-long relationships, mental illness is on the rise, and it may be many years before the job market they are about to enter recovers. The picture for young people is pretty bleak, so they urgently need support and clarity about what their futures hold in store.

Student voices are always heard and valued on The Student Room. 75% of UK students use our platform, so we are in a great position to reflect how young people are thinking, feeling, and behaving to the powers that represent them in government and office.

So, how is the covid-19 pandemic affecting the younger generation? In this blog, we’ll cover current onsite behaviour trends and what these tell us about the key concerns for each age group. We’ll also delve into students’ views on the lockdown and on mental health provision.