Please find the survey results here. They have been cleared of any private information and are being released here for easy access.

Perhaps the most shocking statistic is that 71.4% did not feel part
of the College community in 2020-2021 due to online learning, which suggests
that the student experience was greatly reduced. This is why there
is so much support for fee refunds.

48.1% said that the College is not adequately considering student wellbeing in its decision-making.

44.6% of students said that they are not properly taking care of their own mental wellbeing.

A few comments from students as follows.

“This semester has been ridiculous. We are inundated with lectures posted at different times every week and a workload that never lets up. People are anxious about the pandemic and our futures and we are not being given any kind of lenience or empathy. We are also being assigned 6 hour exams at the end of term. Obviously this year is the first to count towards our degree and requires some level of rigour but we are in an unprecedented situation and I think the college and the School of Maths are being absolutely unreasonable. There is enough pressure on us already – the 6 hour exams should be changed to 24 hour exams.”

It’s impossible to recreate the college experience from home. This is not the fault of the college staff, who have made huge efforts to adapt to the current restrictions. Regardless, this semester has felt very isolating and lonely, which has been somewhat taxing on the mental health. This is just something we have to manage ourselves, and I don’t know how a college can help this in any way, but perhaps some small level of mitigating circumstances in terms of assessment.
We all understand the complexity of the situation and that faculty are in a similar position to us, but its honestly ridiculous to charge the same fee for this years study relative to others, seeing as we get, at best, 1/10th of the exeperience, aid and resources. Charging for gym fees is just disrespectful. The material was clearly made with in person participation/labs, not having altered that comes across as lazy and effortless. I can’t stress enough that we are all sympathetic to the situation we find ourselves in but the respect the college has shown students is laughable. Most professors have put in a great effort to provide us with the material we need especially considering everyone has a different situation to work out of, they have done a great job taking into account that we all have different needs and resources and giving everyone the flexibility needed during these times. The same cannot be said for the universitites efforts or the relevant departments. They have made no effort to bring us back in even though a large part of our course is dependent on labs, rubbing salt in the wound by allowing us to come in one day for a lab only to cancel it again the following week, the means are clearly there but the effort is not. The lack of aid, effort and communication from the university and relevant departments has been nothing short of disrespectful and incredibly dissapointing. I cannot stress enough that charging the same fee for an experience that isn’t even remotely similar has shown the true colours of the university and where their priotise lay, they don’t care for students or the situation we find ourselves in, lining their pockets seems more important, the only positive being that our very kind and caring professors are showing respect to us and the situation we are in.

The college at this stage is actually a joke. We are not being supported whatsoever, I mean how much are the student nurses going through right now with none of your help. Having paid 3k in fees, I have had at least 1 class a day cancelled or pre recorded with no reply to any questions sent through email. Today for example I had a double class in a subject and this morning got an email that it was cancelled, and no not rescheduled, we got a 6 minute podcast from a different lecturer all together on a lecture with 192 slides?! I’m sorry but how does that make sense?! I have learned nothing this year. And for goodness sake answer your emails!!!!

Trinity Education Project is not working – this is the first time I and many of my high-performing friends have suffered from burnout. Partially it is due to the pandemic but we believe it is mainly due to TEP. As a fourth year I have seen us go from 1 exam period per year (which didn’t work), to 2 exam periods per year (which was manageable) and now it feels like we have 4 with all of the course work being split into essays due during reading week and at the end of the semester. 4 is insane, and it isn’t working. Normally we would have a break to prepare for exams and then a break after the exams to decompress. Instead my reading week was the busiest week of term – I had five essays due alongside extracurricular involvement. I have seen people drop their extracurriculars this year because of the intense workload which is insane when nobody has a social life at the moment. Then immediately after reading week I had no time to relax and was launched straight back into the everyday intensity of tutorials and response papers. With exams this year happening after Christmas I have essays due from 7th January, it feels like we will have no time to breathe until I graduate in the summer. Especially this year, with the mental toll of the pandemic, it just isn’t manageable. The essay period feels like an exam period in and of itself, and we have four essay periods per year therefore four exams periods. Something needs to change because this is not sustainable – I would recommend looking to other universities – particularly with the idea of decreasing the amount of module in senior years. We should not be doing the same number of modules as we were doing in first year, and most other universities will only give their students in their final year a couple of modules which makes far more sense than the current model especially with the implications of TEP.
Online college does NOT work. There is zero atmosphere, buzz or energy associated with it. Even students who are suited to it (of which there are v few) feel blindsided by the college’s lack of compassion and support for students in this time. Paying full fees this year is unacceptable, when many lecturers are taking on substantially less labour, facilities are not in use, Less TAs have been hired. This is daylight robbery.
Trinity’s incessant appearances on the news have been disgraceful, with certain leading staff members once again more concerned with the image of the college to the public and to tourists than to actual students. Trinity’s constant dishonesty with regards to allowing students on Campus in small groups is simply unacceptable, as is their refusal to commit to a solid outline for the term ahead, especially when so many students have been forced to travel back to their homes across the world due to covid-19. Online “learning” and this new reliance on technology does NOT work in favour of the student, and the Trinity Education Project is nothing more than a passion project by college board members which practically no one – teaching staff and students alike, finds of benefit.
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