Students stung by financial stress make a strong visual statement

When it comes to money, students have rarely had it easy.

In the past few years, however, their financial stress has grown. Like the rest of us, they’ve seen soaring rents, food inflation and all-round higher costs and, as most students are on a fixed income, they’ve really felt the sting.

In November 2023, a poll of over 40,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students – conducted by StudentSurvey.ie for the Higher Education Authority (HEA) – found that more than a third have considered dropping out of college, with many respondents citing financial pressure.

Tadhg Nolan and Nicola Byrne, third-year graphic design students at the Institute of Art, Design and Technology (IADT) in Dún Laoghaire, met while doing a portfolio preparation course at Gorey School of Art, and have been firm friends ever since. They share an apartment in Dún Laoghaire, and both have struggled with the cost of living.

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“I am supporting myself, so I work three evenings a week, and on weekends,” says Nolan. “The course has quite demanding hours, with studio time from 10am-5pm every day, and we spend a lot of evenings working on our projects. It can be intense and, as graphic design students, we have a lot of costs including paying for paper and materials. I have struggled to pay for it all. It’s hard not to compare yourself to others on the course, especially those who might be living at home.”

Byrne, meanwhile, works at weekends in a pharmacy to help cover her college costs.

“I am mostly supported by my parents, and they pay my rent, but they’re not high-income, and they have made a lot of sacrifices,” she says.

“My brother is due to start college next year so it will be tough to cover all the costs. I get some support from Student Universal Support Ireland (Susi), but because my parent’s income exceeded the rigid threshold by €100, my grant support has gone down.”

Putting in long days at college, working on assignments at night and on weekends, and trying to put in hours at work would take its toll on anyone, but Byrne and Nolan knew they were not alone. And, at the start of this academic year, they had a chance to show it.

“Our lecturer told us about the National Technological University Transformation for Recovery and Resilience (N-TUTORR) programme,” says Byrne.

“This is a collaboration of all the technological universities and institutes of technology to try and improve the educational experience, with themes including education for sustainability, academic integrity and equality, diversity and inclusion, among others. Our class was briefed with taking a theme and developing a project around it. We had the option to work in groups or work alone, so Tadhg and I decided we would focus on student financial stress, and how that can differ from one student to another.”

Nolan had recently been to the Howardena Pindell exhibit at the Irish Museum of Modern Art (Imma).

“As part of the exhibition, there was a room with a short film where a black woman was interviewed about her life,” he says. “Her lived story really connected with me, and I was struck by how engaging with her real-life story evoked a reaction, and I thought: we hear the statistics about student struggles, but it’s those real stories that create a response, and make people feel that sense of connection. We knew that we needed to hear the real voices of students.”

Byrne and Nolan decided that they wanted to interview students about their financial struggles, and create an immersive installation based on their conversations. N-TUTORR provided funding for their project, and the two friends set off to create 66 Voices.

“We started by recording interviews with about 20 students, cutting out snippets related to rent, work and other stressors,” says Nolan.

“Then we sequenced these to present a flat, digital version of what the installation would look like, spent three weeks developing the project, and interviewed another 46 people to make 66 voices in total.”

Why 66?

“We knew we wanted a big number, but not so big that we would be interviewing forever,” says Byrne. “The number 66 also worked, graphically, as a stand-in for quotation marks, and it gave us a logo mark for the project.”

Byrne and Nolan initially focused on students in financial distress, but they soon realised that their project required a broader focus.

“All students come from different financial backgrounds and have different incomes,” says Byrne. “As art and design students, we are used to having to buy materials, but those with less money don’t have the same access to what they need, while those who have to work longer hours have less time to focus on their college work. This is an issue of equality.”

Even the relatively better-off students, however, had some form of stress, they say.

“We showcased stories of people who could not afford lunch, so were stealing bread rolls,” says Nolan.

“We heard from a woman in her 30s who was struggling with the cost of being a student and having children, and from students who were paying well over €1,000 a month for awful accommodation.”

Byrne and Nolan, who have to move out of their apartment soon, have both noticed that rents for new tenancies are higher than existing ones, an observation that is borne out by data from the Residential Tenancies Board.

“It is twice what we were paying three years ago, but it’s that or homelessness,” says Nolan. “The landlords have the power.”

Both of these young artists, who study spatial and experiential design, felt it was important that people didn’t experience the stories simply by reading them on a page.

“They needed to feel it, so when they walked into the space, they would see the words on the boards, and also hear the voices of the students we interviewed,” says Byrne.

“In that space, they feel immersed, without distraction. We wanted there to be a call to action, so as well as creating a poster about the event, we created one about what a lecturer could do to support their students, including being aware of the challenges that students face, making allowances where possible, recommending affordable resources, and advocating for their students.”

While the exhibit was primarily aimed at lecturers, many students told Nolan and Byrne that there was also a positive response from their peers.

“Students felt it reflected their experience and allowed them to see they were not alone – that financial stress is a systemic issue for students,” says Byrne.

Both say that they love their course, but feel that there is a need for wider, systemic change. They would like to see more flexible grant thresholds, the abolition of student charges, and rent caps.

“This project, and the positive reaction to it, has made me feel hopeful,” Nolan says. “I want to keep designing for change, and evoking feelings through design.”

Some of the financial struggles of IADT students

“I buy a lot of frozen pizzas because it’s a whole meal for €1.75.”

“I’ve robbed bread rolls from Lidl to have for my lunch.”

“We paid €1,200 to share a digs bed in an attic.”

“From evenings to mornings, I work basically whenever I can.”

“I ask myself: do I eat lunch today, or go out and connect with people?”

“There’s that, like, feeling of guilt asking people for money.”

“€660 a month and I live in a room with no windows.”

“We have to pay for Adobe, that’s like €30 a month.”

“I live at home in Meath, it takes me two hours to commute.”

“The landlord just didn’t fix it, I went to them many times and they kept saying they would send someone, but they never actually came. There was nothing else I could about that so eventually we just had to go and pay for it ourselves.”