In October 2022, Arts Students' Union (Arts SU) ran its Cost of Living Survey to give University of the Arts London (UAL) students the opportunity to voice their concerns, views, and feedback about the cost of living crisis in the UK to their Students' Union, and how it has affected their livelihoods and their studies. Over 1,000 students from across UAL's six constituent colleges responded to the survey, and on 15th February 2023, the Policy & Research team released a comprehensive report into its findings.

The survey ran from 3rd October 2022 to 15th November 2022, and received 1,425 responses in total.

Our Sabbatical Officers said:

"Arguably the most pressing issue on a university student’s experience right now is the Cost of Living crisis, which we know for many UAL students has spiralled out of control and had a huge impact.  

In October, we launched one of our largest research projects to date to find out how the crisis is impacting our students and what more we can do. [...]

The Sabbatical Officers have made it a key priority this academic year to help ease the burden of the crisis on our students, by focusing on making basic everyday items free to our students who need them the most. This has included free meals, free art supply giveaways, and free food parcels. As we continue through the academic year, we will continue to evaluate and create ways that we can support students during this hard time."

You can read the Officers' full statement here, and find out more about what our Officers do here.

You can find Arts SU's full cost of living crisis hub here.

You can find the report here.

We also submitted a response to the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Students, which was cited in its recent report about the impact of the cost of living crisis on students. You can read our submission here.

Would you like to get in touch with Arts SU about this campaign, report, or any other matter? Find out how.