We can all agree that people are much more productive in all areas of life when they're happy. College, however, can be a very dark time in a person's life as the crushing weight of academic pressure bears down on them. Thankfully, you're not a student (or at least you're not while playing Two Point Campus), and while you do need to push students to get the best grades possible, you're also just as responsible for their happiness.
Student Happiness is probably the most important factor in whether or not you will succeed in Two Point Campus. If Happiness gets too low, you'll quickly find yourself spiraling downward until you run out of funds and end up shutting down. While you can't go up to each student and give them a hug and a pep talk to cheer them up, there are plenty of methods at your disposal to increase their Happiness. Here's the best way to keep all your students happy and healthy in Two Point Campus.
Further reading
What is Student Happiness and what does it do?
What is Happiness? While we're not qualified to answer that question in real life, we certainly can tell you what it is in Two Point Campus. Happiness is a metric you can look at for all your current students that directly impacts how well your entire institution will perform. Unhappy students will start to get bad grades and eventually even drop out. As terrible as it sounds, you need to keep those students around to pay tuition or you'll go bankrupt. To stay safe, you should aim to never let this drop much below 70%.
Student Happiness can drop for a number of reasons, most notably that their basic needs are not met, there are no places to study, they don't enjoy their environment, and they have no friends or relationships.
How to increase Happiness
Knowing what makes students unhappy and doing the opposite is a decent way to keep their overall mood up, but this can be tricky to manage when you're also trying to keep your university afloat and running smoothly at the same time. Here are the four most important ways to boost Student Happiness.
Step 1: Make sure you have all the essential facilities. Students have a number of meters that all contribute to their Happiness, such as energy, health, food, drink, toilet comfort, hygiene, and entertainment. The facilities you want to build to address these are:
- Dorms with at least six beds in each room, with a rough ratio of six beds per student.
- An equal number of showers and beds, and at least one bathroom in every building.
- Food vendors, or at least vending machines. Food vendors will fill student hunger and thirst much better, are healthier, and can grant them temporary buffs, unlike vending machines.
- A Medical Office to treat any sick students or heal any injuries, plus a Pastoral Office.
Step 2: Make sure to start up Student Clubs and host entertainment events. Clubs grant even more bonuses to students but also help keep them from burning out and let them make friends. You can also build Student Lounges and Student Unions if you've got the extra space and money. There are 10 different events you can host, and each offers its own buffs, but all will improve Happiness.
Step 3: Decorations not only help improve your university's attractiveness, but they also keep students from feeling like they're in Two Point Prison. Add plenty of flair both inside and out to keep spirits up.
Step 4: Food should never be too far away. Students are notoriously hungry creatures, so make sure they're never more than a few minutes away from a food or drink vendor to replenish their energy.
Step 5: Students are going to get sick and injured. There's no getting around it, so you need to be prepared with a Medical Office to get them back on their feet as quickly as possible. The Pastoral Office is just as important, since mental health needs to be addressed just as much as physical needs. Also like in real life, some students may not realize they need this service, but you can direct them to go there by selecting them individually.
