Students taking on fewer extracurricular activities

The number of hours that students in the Netherlands spend on extracurricular activities has decreased dramatically since 2005. This is borne out by a survey conducted by the career website Magnet.me in partnership with the National Chamber of Associations (LKvV).

Students who started their studies 14 years ago still devoted over 600 hours per year on average to volunteer or board work, according to data published on the website. In the case of the generation that has just graduated (and started in 2013, in other words), this total has dropped to a third of the 2005 tally: around 200 hours. And more and more students aren’t taking on any extracurricular obligations whatsoever. We can also observe a decline when the scope is limited to students who do engage in extracurricular activities: the number of hours invested has dropped from 800 to 558.

Most students who started after 2013 have not yet rounded off their programme, meaning we’ll have to wait for the full story on their activities.

Increasingly hard

LKvV recognises this trend. “It’s becoming harder and harder for associations to find people for their boards and committees,” says LKvV chair Iris van Noort. “Particularly for committees that aren’t expected to look particularly good on one’s CV – the bar committee, for example. This generation of students grew up during the crisis. More than anything, they want to be sure of a job after graduation.”

Apart from the economic crisis, the introduction of the binding study advice in 2005 is assumed to have contributed to this trend. And there are other factors besides, according to Van Noort: “At some universities, students no longer have the opportunity to resit an exam – which puts them under even more pressure to be on the safe side and commit all their time to their studies.”

Magnet.me examined the profiles of over 60,000 students in connection with this survey.