W 073 F

Introduction

University differs from high-schools in many ways. Here are no classes of twenty or more people with whom students can get known easily, and who stay in the class for four years. Here are eighty students, who started university in the same year, and at every seminar each of them have different groupmates. It may happen that in their seventh semester they have groupmates they have never seen before.

When conducting the survey I was interested in how well the students can know each other in this ever-changing situation. How does the fact that they have the same groupmates for only one term affect their shaping relationships? Is one semester enough to learn the names of their groupmates?

Method

I stopped students on corridors and in the main hall and asked them to answer eight questions. The questions were in Hungarian, because I thought it was more informal to ask students in their native language, so they could answer more freely. I asked twenty students, all English majors. Everybody agreed to answer my questions. There were seven first-year students, ten in their second year, and three in their third. This is only a fraction of all English majors, but examining the answers allows us to discover some trends. Since I selected people at random, they probably have similar opinions as the others I have not asked.

The questions were the following:

1.) How many people did you know when you first came here?
2.) Did you take part in the first year students' week? If yes, did it help you to get known with other university students, especially English majors?
3.) How long did it take you to identify who the first year English majors were (just the faces)?
4.) Could you name all the participants at any of your seminars this term?
5.) Did you make friends with other students or did you rather keep your old friends?
6.) If you made new friends, on what basis did you choose them?
7.) Do you give help to others or do you rather ask for help from other students for your studies (notes, books, and essays)?
8.) Do you think there is an outstanding person at the English Department? (In his or her character, studies, or other activities.)
(Questions 6. and 8. were taken from Kalmár's book 33-37 and 152-154.)

Results and Discussion

Known people

To my first question, "how many people did you know when you first came here?" I received wide-ranging answers. Two people said they did not know anybody here. Five students answered that they knew only one or two people. Also, five persons claimed they knew not more than five other students. Two students said they knew around ten people here. Six answered they recognized between 15 to 20 familiar people.

Those who had not more than two people they knew at the university did not come from Pécs, and from their high schools only a very few people came to this university. Most of those who had more than ten familiar people here either live or have studied here in Pécs. From their high schools many students study here.

First year students' camp

To my second question, did you take part in the first year students' camp?" eight of the twenty students answered they did not take part. To my first question about known people these students, with two exceptions, said they knew less than three people. Out of the 12 people who did participate in the camp two said it only helped them a little to get acquainted with other students. One out of these two arrived later, so she missed the first days.

The remaining ten people claimed the camp helped them a lot in getting acquainted with other university students. One person said she knew all the people when she came here from the camp.

Identifying other English majors

The answers to my question "how long did it take you to identify who the first year English majors were?" showed big differences. Three students said they could memorize the faces within one and a half months. Five claimed they learnt the faces in half a year. Nine people said, including all but one of the first year students, that after a term they could recognize more than half of their mates, out of these nine seven claimed that it is not less than 3/4. One person said he needed a year for this, and two said it took them one and a half years to learn the faces.

Naming groupmates of a seminar

Fourteen out of the 20 students answered to my fourth question "could you name all the participants at any of your seminars this term?" that they would not be able to name all their groupmates. Out of them four claimed they could match a name for only half of their groupmates. The remaining ten said they could name 3/4 or more, but not all.

Six of the 20 said there was one seminar at which they could name all the members of the group. Usually in these groups there were only a few people, or they were Language Practice courses.

New friends from the university

To my fifth question, "did you make friends with other students or did you rather keep your old friends?" only one person answered she did not make friends with anybody from the university, and she had kept her old friends. The remaining 19 students claimed they had both kept their old friends and made new ones here.

On what basis

My sixth question was: "if you made new friends, on what basis did you choose them?" Seven students said they made friends with people who they lived with, they either rented the same flat, or lived in the dormitory. All of the 19 claimed they chose some of their groupmates to be their friends. One person said she started choosing her friends in the first year students' camp. One surprising answer to this question was that she met with her future friend by accident in the main hall.

Giving and asking for help

All of the 20 students answered to this question that they both gave and asked for help in their studies. One person said he usually asked for more help than she gave, eight claimed they gave more help to others than they asked for. Eleven people said they gave approximately as much help as they asked for.

Outstanding personalities

With this question I wanted to find out if students thought of each other as equal or did they choose somebody to look up on. My hypothesis was that there are students who are believed to be worth looking upon, who are considered to be the ideal students.

Eleven people, including seven of the first year students said they did not have the time to find out if there was such a person, or they said there must be outstanding people here but they could not, or did not want to name any.

The remaining nine students named one or two people. The most votes (three) went to Babarci Bulcsu. Tarrósy István and Papp Árpád both received two votes. Regõs Artúr and Demeter Andrea got one vote each. One student named a teacher, Komlósi László, in answer to this question.

What I found out from the interviews was that students came to this university with very different backgrounds. Some got here with a lot of friends, and adapting to the new circumstances was obviously easier, if they were not complete strangers here. Others came here with no acquaintances, so it was a bigger urge for them to get known with other people.

Those who took part in the first year students' camp had the opportunity to start getting acquainted with others two weeks earlier and in a much calmer environment.

I also discovered that, although there were individual differences, for many students it took at least half a year to identify the first-year English majors by their faces, and that usually one term was not enough to learn all the names of all of their groupmates, in fact for some this was only enough to learn half of the names.

Almost all of the students made friends with others, although choosing friends was not deliberate. Many students did not have a firm answer to the question: "on what basis did you chose your friends?" Rather it was by accident, they selected a few people who they liked from the people they lived with or attended the same courses with.

Although most of the first-year students said they did not have enough time to learn many things about other English majors, it was common that students looked upon hose people, who they thought were above the average. Mostly the characters and the activities of these students were the reasons for the choices.

Reactions to my survey

None of the students I stopped refused to answer my questions. My survey received varying reactions. Some took it very seriously and thought a lot about every answer. Others enjoyed it and perceived it as fun. Many said they expected something worse when they heard my intentions. There was a History major, who became very enthusiastic and would have liked to take part in the survey, when he heard my conversation with an English major.

Conclusion

This survey generally brought results similar to my views about the interactions between students. However, there were some unexpected and surprising answers as well.

Although I expected it to be so , I found it somehow depressing that my respondents attended courses for half a year but still do not know the names of the others there. It would not be a hard task to remember 15 or 25 names, when they have a full term to practise. Usually at seminars where students have the opportunity to speak and to air their own views (so they are more personal) were the most names known. It is strange that students expect the teachers to remember all the names after the first month, but themselves do not care to do the same.