Loneliness has unfortunately been a recurring theme among college students lately, which can be surprising to many of us. College should be the time in a student’s life when they can spread their wings and figure out who they are. As student activities directors, it’s our mission to support students as they grow and discover who they are. And as activity coordinators, it is our role to combat the student loneliness epidemic, and that’s what we are here to do today at Neon.
At Neon Entertainment, we have decades of experience providing entertainment for campus events that gets students socializing and having fun together, stopping this loneliness in its tracks. We’re here to explain student loneliness and how professional entertainment at your college events can help fight it.
What is the Student Loneliness Epidemic?
The student loneliness epidemic is an upward trend of college students feeling more and more lonely in their lives around campus. The 2024-2025 Healthy Minds Study shows that 57% of college undergraduates are sometimes or always lonely, with that number at 74% for transgender or non-binary students. These numbers were worse a few years ago, but if you work around a campus every day, you can see with your own eyes that students are still suffering from loneliness all over.
Oftentimes, this loneliness is associated with substance use, with lonely students more likely to turn to alcohol, marijuana, and other substances. One lonely student put it: “The only times I have fun here is when I’m intoxicated”
The cause of this epidemic is uncertain; often, social media will be cited, or the broader existence of the internet as a whole, or the stress of being in a new environment, or being separated from friends and family. The reality is that it’s here, and it’s our duty to do everything we can to support our students through it.
How Campus Events Can Prevent Student Loneliness
We can help campuses combat this problem. There are many ways to prevent student loneliness; the most effective is having genuine connections with other students. As event coordinators, it is our responsibility to bolster these connections and create events that get students engaging with eachother.
At Neon Entertainment, we specialize in providing high-quality entertainment that is designed to get students engaging with eachother and making genuine connections with eachother. We know how to get students interacting and how to create shared experiences that students will bond over.
As an example, let’s use a Mobile Axe Throwing event. We bring our axe throwing to your campus for students to participate in. The whole time, they are doing a unique, entertaining experience, laughing and having fun with their fellow college students and competing against eachother and themselves in a friendly, fun way to get a high score. Students take pictures, have a blast, let off some stress, and then when the event is done, we take it with us, leaving the memories behind.
This relatively simple event has not only entertained your students and helped them let off some steam, but it has allowed them to have real connections with other students. Entertainment fueled by fun, not by alcohol. When the event ends, the students will still carry with them the memory of participating for years to come, and they bond with each other by having that shared experience.
What Campus Events Support Student Engagement?
It’s not just Mobile Axe Throwing; there are so many different types of entertainment that you could bring to your college that support students genuinely connecting with eachother. Roller Rinks, Comedians, Game Shows, Escape Rooms, DIY Events, Rage Rooms, and so many more.
Any activations that provide students with opportunities to engage with eachother, while being actually entertaining, are valuable tools that student activities departments can utilize to boost student engagement, while preventing student loneliness.
Having these activities available to students gives them something to do. Almost all college students want to make friends and are looking for ways to do that. These activities give students opportunities to make friends, have fun, and prevent loneliness on their own terms without being forced to connect with eachother through awkward group projects or mandatory “introduce yourself to the class” moments.
Battle Student Loneliness at Your Campus
We’ve mentioned before that providing these experiences is what we specialize in at Neon Entertainment. We want to support the mission of combating loneliness in college students, and we want to help them grow during this special time in their lives.
If you are considering bringing any of our interactive entertainment to your next campus event, we would love to talk to you. We truly have a wide selection of activities we provide. If you have questions or don’t know which event is correct for your campus, we are ready to provide you with answers and solutions so you can get your students the events that they deserve.
