It was the first week of August. METKA and student organisations were making their final preparations for the orientation weeks. Plans were made, resources were allocated. The post-holiday buzz kept up the good vibes and the student advocates were ready to welcome the new students.
The Karamalmi campus has caused worry for METKA earlier in the spring. Talk of removing the library from the campus sounded like a completely nonsensical idea. Some debate was held, dissenting opinions were submitted, but Metropolia’s short-sighted plan remained to be implemented.
One battle had been lost, but the war was not yet over. After all, we had just got a lounge in the fifth floor lobby and a pool table on the seventh floor. So there was still hope. The Karamalmi campus has never been particularly welcoming. When classes started on the 4th floor in autumn 2019, there weren’t even any walls in the classrooms. Temporary walls were a good temporary solution that eventually lasted for a year. During the summer of 2020, the campus was renovated. Students were delighted to hear that they would have access to real classrooms in the autumn. Unfortunately, studying in classrooms is only one part of higher education.
Student well-being has been on everyone’s minds since covid. Comfortable facilities are a really important part of it. Students don’t want to return to a campus that doesn’t feel like home. Students who feel comfortable on campus do better in their studies. Students who enjoy their campus meet fellow students in a shared, safe environment, sharing ideas and opinions. A student who enjoys their campus is happy and proud of their university.
Working groups were set up, METKA and local student organisations were invited – apparently just to say that the student voice has been heard. The feeling of inadequacy is heavy. It is frustrating to gather feedback from students, prepare documents, and justify opinions to an organisation to which we as students seem to be only one part of the turnover and its growth.
We came to the lounge that we had set up and prepared to welcome new students to Metropolia. Unfortunately, the greetings from Metropolia were not as warm – Metropolia is about to hand over two classrooms on the fifth floor for use to Leppävaara high school. In the future, there will be free access from the street level to the fifth floor without any access rights. The lounge was made with money from the MMKK project led by Metropolia, made possible and organised by METKA. The money for the project comes from the ministry of education and culture, not from Metropolia. The lounge was made specifically for the students of Karamalmi. Access for outsiders means that the things available in the lounge can not be freely accessible anymore. Removing the lounge wastes taxpayer money. The first place where Karamalmi students were able to stay and spend time on their own home campus will also be the last. It’s interesting how Karamalmi doesn’t have one separate space for its own students, but suddenly there’s two classrooms available for high school without asking any student organisations that actively work for the students of Karamalmi.
But, all hope is not lost. Metropolia has come up with a good solution for the comfort of Karamalmi students – half of the courses and majors after the first year of Information and Communication Technology have been moved to other campuses.
Writings of Karamalmi’s downward spiral were not written on the walls – as we didn’t have any in the first place.
Eero Hemminki
Information and Communication Technology student
Vice chair of Metropolia Student Union METKA
Karamalmi campus
This post is also available in Suomi.