An idea on a poster is one thing. Putting it in front of the people who actually run a university is another. Through the spring and summer of 2024 we sat down with staff and decision-makers at Queen’s University to talk seriously about piloting Everconnected with students.
The conversations returned to the same realisation. Universities already pour real effort into student support: counselling, services, wellbeing campaigns. But you cannot prescribe belonging the way you prescribe a service. Students don’t only need help when things go wrong, they need to feel, day to day, that they belong somewhere and to someone. That is a harder thing to build, and a more important one.
We talked through what a campus pilot might actually look like, where it would sit, and how to keep students safe inside it. There was genuine interest in trying it. More than the logistics, what stayed with us was the recognition, from people who see the problem up close, that connection itself is worth designing for.