Original title: ‘We Belong Here Too’: Assessing Postgraduate Taught Satisfaction Across Three UK Higher Education Institutions
Kelly Edmunds, Edward R. Ivimey-Cook, Ellen Bell, Dr Angela Hibbs +1 · September 2026
Universities in the UK have many postgraduate taught students, who take advanced degrees after finishing college. Most research on student happiness focuses only on undergraduates. This leaves a gap in understanding how master's-level students feel about their university experience. Researchers examined satisfaction among postgraduate taught students across three UK universities. They tested how two factors shape this experience: studying full-time versus part-time, and whether students had attended that same school before. They found that students who studied part-time were less likely to attend events, build meaningful relationships, or feel like they belonged. Returning students who previously studied at the same institution faced these exact same struggles. To fix this, universities must offer flexible, tailored support rather than just recycling undergraduate activities.
You join a club where you already know a few people. Everyone assumes you'll settle in easily, so nobody introduces you around, and you end up feeling more left out than the total strangers who get a proper welcome. In this paper, postgraduate students who had studied at the same university before, or who studied part-time, were less likely to go to events or feel they belonged. The researchers say these students need support designed for them, not the same activities as everyone else.
Universities pour effort into undergraduate belonging, but this study shows postgraduate taught students—especially part-time and returning ones—are the ones quietly disengaging. If universities want these students to stay, thrive, and recommend the institution, they need events and support designed for their actual lives, not copied from undergrad programs.
The abstract doesn't say. It reports findings from three UK institutions and suggests bespoke support, but it does not discuss generalizability or causal claims.
Ask anything about this paper. Answers come from its abstract, and say so when the abstract doesn't cover your question.
‘We Belong Here Too’: Assessing Postgraduate Taught Satisfaction Across Three UK Higher Education Institutions — Kelly Edmunds, Edward R. Ivimey-Cook, Ellen Bell et al. — EdArXiv — doi:10.35542/osf.io/twdqs_v1
Abstract licence: CC BY
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper. This is a preprint, so it hasn't necessarily been peer reviewed.