Agents lie and distort the reality, students struggle with housing, academic integration and the language, and some find it hard to support themselves financially.
The problems faced by international students are pretty universal – but the efforts that universities and their governments put into fixing them can vary enormously.
So following lobbying from students, it’s interesting that here in Latvia, to boost the reputation of its higher education system, the Ministry of Education and Science has laid down a new rulebook on attracting international students and delivering studies.
Universities have to employ qualified lecturers with foreign language proficiency, provide language courses for international students, have to organise training for all staff on intercultural communication and cultural difference, and are required to interview a sample of international students (picked by the SU) to test satisfaction and identify and fix problems they have encountered in their studies or in their everyday life.
Students transfer their subsistence funds to the university for disbursement, which gets around some students being loaned the money for a week to get past the Home Office test. And crucially, recruitment agents have to be declared and satisfaction with/accuracy of the information they provided tested by universities.
There’s naturally some suspicion over whether universities will stick to what is, for now, a voluntary agreement – but it’s the kind of sector-wide development that flows from the concerns of students that’s common here.
0.5 per cent
We’re in Riga today on Day 0 the Wonkhe SUs study tour to the Baltics and Finland, where tomorrow 40 or so student leaders and SU staff will begin a five day tour of over 30 students’ unions, guilds, fraternities, and even the odd university official too.
One of the things that helps in Latvia isn’t just its size, it’s the law that underpins HE and the rights that it affords students. Its NUS is established in law as an “expert” organisation to consult with, SUs are guaranteed 1/200 of the university’s budget, and via the SU there’s 20 percent of places on every university committee – along with (as in Lithuania) the power of veto over decisions.
It’s a set of arrangements that many might baulk at in the UK, but clearly helps to tip the balance of power a little toward the student interest – and results in fantastic student representation work like the study modernization agreement. A long term deal between the Rector (VC) and the SU, it aims to deliver a better student experience by aligning it with the latest trends in European higher education and science, LU’s strategy, and student interests.
There’s all sorts in there – access to spaces (from Spring 2024, LU will develop a system allowing students additional access to study and relaxation spaces in all Academic Center buildings outside class hours), better internal communication (LU will establish and implement guidelines for unified communication among students, academic, and general staff) and guaranteed academic integrity education in the first semester.
Much of it is the sort of thing we might see in officer manifestos or reports from NSS results – but contrasted with the way in which representational goals in the UK can tend be quite short term (and often hard to get agreement on), it’s both symbolically and practically impressive.
Assertive rather than process based representation is often underpinned by quite creative projects. At Kaunas University of Technology, for example, International Students’ Day is commemorated as a celebration of students rather than a day about international students. The SU gets all of its reps – almost 200 of them if you add up the faculty council committees – to mark the day by taking over non-academic and management roles (including the Rector and Vice-Rector) to improve understanding both ways – with students taking proposals for improvement of key university processes and services as a result.
Meanwhile in Kaunas, rather than a tussle between managers in the SU and managers in the university over who should run its Student Leisure Center (SLC), an agreement was reached that it would be a partnership but one run by a dedicated committee of students who want to make the space a success. As well as offering students a place to rest, study, and socialise, it also hosts events like game nights and movie nights designed to help students students to communicate, relax, and connect outside of their own study area. It’s a student facility with an obvious purpose, that really feels like students’ second home.
In Lithuania there’s no guarantee on SU funding, but citizens do have the option to direct 1.2% of their annual personal income tax to various eligible third sector organisations – and SUs are on the list. The system is designed to foster a direct relationship between taxpayers and social, cultural, or educational institutions they wish to support – almost like a personal version of the apprenticeship levy. SUs very much encourage themselves as the recipients – and it binds in SUs taking active steps to explain their important work to the public.
You’re so shallow
In both Latvia and Lithuania, SUs tend to have component unions organised around faculties, with their own leadership, welcome work, careers initiatives and blend of both representational and social functions. It means that students’ principal contact with their SU feels more personal and local than we often see in the UK with our ultimately relatively arbitrary splits between representation and activities – boosting belonging in the process.
As well as those “shallower ends” we often talk about that build “bonding” social capital, there’s plenty of bridging going on here too. The country’s size makes it possible to organise StudyFest, a huge annual event that sees students from across Latvia come together to engage in activities, networking, discussion and music.
Aimed at fostering connections among students from different universities amidst wider sector consolidation, the event also has plenty of engagement from corporate partners in an effort to drive up students’ access to good careers.
Development of the student as a whole person is an important agenda for all the SU’s we’ve met so far – at Riga Technical SU, for example, SOLIS is a three-day leadership skills, development and self-growth seminar for final year undergraduate, master’s and doctoral students.
Across the three days, participants have the opportunity to hear lectures about discovering their talents, taking responsibility, what companies are looking for in the job market and influencing the businesses and organisations they might be about to join towards social responsibility.
One thing that’s confusing is that in both countries, there’s much less focus on “clubs and societies” and much more on events, projects and initiatives. That’s not to say that groups don’t exist – but it does mean that SUs end up supporting a much more diverse programme of student opportunities than we might see in the UK.
At Mykolas Romeris University (MRU), for example, a few years ago students applied to celebrate Vilnius’s anniversary with MRU NAKTIS – a night of legendary festivities including lectures and discussions by Lithuanian celebrities, international cultures in the “MRUniverse” space, a secret guest’s concert, and Karaoke. Students now clamour to get involved in running the annual event.
More from Latvia tomorrow, and then Tartu in Estonia – where we assume the Kissing Students fountain will be frozen up.
