Why Groningen?

Almost a quarter of Groningen’s population is composed of students. Every year, thousands of students choose to study in Groningen, but why?

As students ourselves, we were curious as to what factors other students considered when they decided where they wanted to study, and if there was anything that made them hesitate. In order to investigate this, we conducted a survey, to which 48 students in Groningen responded. We asked them about their origin, what they were studying, and push and pull factors affecting them both in coming to, Groningen and what may affect them in the future.

Push and pull factors may sound a bit confusing, so we’ll define them. Push factors are factors that drive people away and are reasons for people to migrate, think about something like lack of jobs. Of course there are stay factors too, like family and friends. The same considerations that push people away from one place can pull them to another place. The reasons that attract people to a place are called pull factors, stay away factors, meanwhile, are reasons why people would not want to migrate to a certain place.

Who are our participants?

The majority of our subjects were bachelor students and studied at UCG, the reason for this is that we are UCG students ourselves. We utilised our personal contacts to spread the survey, the majority of which was comprised of UCG students. Moreover, UCG is an international faculty, which made it even more interesting to look at  students’ motivations in choosing groningen as their place of study despite high moving costs and a long travel distance.

The nationalities of our respondents can be seen in the table below:

While all of these students have obviously chosen to study in Groningen,we were also curious about what other options had they considered, and why. 

What came out was a very strong preference towards Dutch universities in general, even if just a quarter of the sample was Dutch. The country as a whole and not just the city of Groningen appears to have been a strong pull factor.

Many respondents indicated a university in their home country as other options. The “stay” factors of friends and family prove especially strong for young people. 

Factors Bringing Students to Groningen.

In order to investigate how pull factors affected students coming to Groningen, we asked participants “what did you find attractive about studying in Groningen?”. 

Rather unsurprisingly, the majority of our university students mentioned their specific study, or the overall quality and reputation of the University of Groningen, as being reasons to come to the city. More interestingly, we found a fairly even balance between this and other pull factors. With most responses including two or more factors, we could explore the importance of other factors in their decision making.

The social environment of Groningen,encompassing its international environment and high student population, the quality of the city itself, including its size, attractiveness and overall lifestyle, and its geographic location were fairly evenly mentioned. We found that the location of Groningen was the second most mentioned pull factor, just three responses short of the university. Responses under this category mostly mentioned proximity to friends or family, with two mentioning distance, referring to a desire to study abroad. 

Stay away factors, or reasons that made our subjects hesitate about moving to Groningen, can be grouped in similar categories. A confidence in the University is highlighted with few concerns about it, and those that did have concerns were personal worries about their selection of program. The majority of stay away factors mentioned relate to adapting to the social life within Groningen. Concerns about language (not being able to speak Dutch), the student housing shortage and the distance of the city from either the rest of the civilized world country, or their home country, were prevalent stay away factors mentioned.

Future Push and Stay Factors

Finally, we asked the participants if they thought they wanted to stay in Groningen after obtaining their degrees. Half of our participants informed us they didn’t know, while nine wanted to stay, and fifteen wanted to leave. The stay factors for remaining in Groningen after their current education differed greatly between participants. Some enjoyed the city a lot, while others mentioned that they were interested in masters in Groningen. There was one mention of opportunity in Groningen, but no specific mention regarding jobs. In contrast to the leaving group, where a job someplace else was mentioned as a motivator to leave Groningen. The 15 people who told us that they would leave after their education also had varied reasons. Similarly to the stay group, participants in the leaving group wanted to choose their place of residence based on their desired masters. Many also mentioned they wanted to explore other places and cultures while others wanted to return to their home country. 

We thought it would be interesting to see where previous UCG students ended up, so check out this link to see what masters degrees they pursue; 

https://www.rug.nl/ucg/about-us/after-ucg

Conclusion

After analyzing the results, we found that there are many reasons why people choose Groningen as their student city. Most choose it because of the programs the educational institutions provide. Many also choose it because of the city, it’s location and it’s small size. However, some responses regarded these as reasons to leave , while others simply decided to continue their education elsewhere. 

The range of reasons why people come and leave Groningen is vast and this survey was just the tip of the iceberg. Still it is was great to learn about what motivates people to come here, and what in time will motivate them to leave. What motivated you to choose your student city? Do you consider going somewhere else after getting your degree, and why? We would love to hear your answers, so please comment below.

written by: Daniel MacRae, Arianna Salvatori and Cathelijne van der Voort