How to Talk to Current Students and Verify What They Tell You About a University

Why current students matter more than the prospectus

Marketing materials describe the university a department wants you to see. A current student describes the university they live in day to day: the queue at the international office, the real seminar size, how easy it is to make friends outside your own nationality. Treat their answers as evidence, not final proof, and gather more than one opinion before you decide.

Where to find students to talk to

• University ambassador or mentor programmes: most universities list current students by subject and country who agree to answer questions by email or video call.

• Open day volunteers: students staffing an open day booth often give more honest answers once you step away from staff.

• Independent student forums and subreddits for the university or the city.

• Alumni groups on LinkedIn, useful for asking what graduates do a year or two after finishing.

• Social media search: search the university name plus your subject on TikTok and Instagram for day-in-the-life content from real students.

How many students is enough

Talk to at least three to five students per university before drawing conclusions, ideally from different years and backgrounds. One glowing review or one bad experience does not represent a programme with hundreds of students. Patterns across several conversations matter more than any single quote.

Questions that get honest answers

General questions get general answers. Ask specific, concrete questions that push past a marketing-line response.

• Describe a normal Tuesday for you, from waking up to going to bed.

• How many hours of contact teaching do you get per week, and how much is self-study?

• What was the hardest part of your first term, and what would you change about the university?

• How long did it take you to find housing, and what did it cost?

• Would you choose this university again, and why or why not?

Spotting bias in what students tell you

Ambassadors get chosen partly because they are positive about the university, so weigh their answers against independent sources. A student who loves their programme but struggled with housing gives you useful, specific information. A student who says everything is great and nothing more gives you almost nothing.

• Vague praise such as 'everything is amazing' tells you nothing. A specific detail, like a seminar group shrinking from 15 to 6 students, tells you something real.

• Ask the same question to students from different years, since experiences change with staff and policy.

• Notice if a student avoids a direct question about cost or workload, and ask again a different way.

Checking claims against official data

Once a student makes a specific claim, verify it against another source. Compare a claimed dropout rate against the university's own published statistics or the national quality agency's reports. Check a claimed class size against the department's published staff-to-student ratio. Confirm a claimed job placement rate against the university's official graduate outcomes page rather than one student's guess.

Combine student testimony with official numbers rather than choosing one over the other. Testimony tells you what daily life feels like, official data tells you whether that experience holds across the whole programme.

Following up after the conversation

Send a short thank-you message after a longer conversation, and ask whether reaching out again closer to the application deadline works for them. Keep a simple log of who you spoke to, when, and what they told you, so you compare answers once you finish talking to students across several universities.