76% of students at The New School experienced isolation or disconnection from their peers in the fall of 2024, according to the Fall 2024 Mid-Semester Check-In Survey.

Tamara Oyola Santiago, director of public health services within Student Health Services (SHS), says this goes back to 2020, when the world shut down and went online due to COVID-19.

“We’re still really affected by COVID-19, how we interrelate with each other … having to get a new vaccine every year, right? I think that even social dynamics of social solidarity have impacted our ability to be with each other and how we learn,” she said.

COVID was not an ideal time for students struggling with mental health at TNS, as during the lockdown, SHS staff were laid off.

“We were laid off during COVID, most of the mental health team, I believe,” counselor at SHS Ruchi Amin said.

A report done by the National College Health Assessment (NCHA), which has been conducted every two years since 2005 at TNS, showed that 85% of New School students (graduates and undergraduates) feel that they belong at the university, a 3% increase from 2023. Despite this increase, the report found that TNS lags significantly behind other reference groups. 90% of students felt a sense of belonging at their college/university (compared to 85% at TNS).

This survey is slightly more recent, as it was conducted in spring 2025 between February and March.

78% of students agreed that TNS prioritizes health and well-being (rising from 66% in 2023), and 77% of students agreed that the community looked out for one another (up from 69%).

When compiling a presentation summarizing the report, staff at TNS included that “it is important to note that nearly a quarter of students this year expressed disagreement—especially senior undergraduates.”

The areas where The New School does not meet the national statistics are sleep issues and depression. Where other institutions had 20% of students say they felt depression had ‘negatively impacted performance in class’ and delayed progress towards a degree, TNS had 23%.

This could also be attributed to TNS’s campus sprawling across Lower Manhattan, Amin said.

“I wouldn’t say that it’s particular to New School students, you know. I would say it’s particular to urban settings for colleges, because, as you all know, like the campus is so dispersed,” Amin said. “We also have a very high population of international students. Not all of them have been in New York before.”

A lot of students at TNS utilize the free counseling services at SHS, but this is likely to change in the near future.

“We are slammed,” Amin said.

Amin also noted that both domestic and international students often experience significant roommate issues.

“Another thing is roommate issues. A lot of roommate issues, beginning of the year, other than that, a lot of academic stress,” Amin said.

“You hear like things like New York is such a monster of a city, and you get a little scared…I know there’s the freshman policy, you are required to live on campus,” Housing Operations and Graduate Resident Advisor Fatima Mendez said. “Students are adjusting to living with other people and having to almost accommodate and learn how to set boundaries.” 

Mendez said that out of the three to four days she comes into the office, she sees a single room request almost every time.

Mendez said that these roommate assignments can be like putting “water with fire.” “If you don’t have a comfortable living situation, I can see why, at times, it can feel lonely,” she said.