The first step for the Student Toolbox realisation has been the creation of a report with the objective to thoroughly outline the stages of the university student’s progression, named the “Student Journey” within the project.

At each step of this journey, important decisions are made, spanning from the initial aspiration to pursue higher education to the selection of faculty, university, housing arrangements, and extracurricular pursuits, culminating in career orientation choices. However, the lack of a clearly defined path leads to uncertainty for students and prevents support systems to effectively guide them.

Therefore, the primary aim of our research was to identify the critical moments within the student’s path and ascertain the most pertinent support services tailored to each specific situation.

By establishing a nexus between the student journey and relevant services, the project can optimize the functionality of the European Student Card (ESC), facilitating seamless interaction among students, universities, and service providers.

The key action of the first phase is mapping the various elements of the student journey to pinpoint specific decision points encountered by students across three overarching areas: Access, Participation, and Completion. This mapping exercise has pointed out the critical junctures within each phase of the university course.

Taking into account the impact that the “Student Journey Map” may have both for the ESC-tension project and for the in-depth activities, in this page we’re proposing the model we’ve defined. It can be freely used and downloaded, simply mentioning the ESC-tension 2 as the source. In this way, it will be available for use in any context by any ambassador of the European Student Card Initiative.