How Successfully Do We Integrate Newcomers?
Interviews with New Members
Written by Maowi
Integration is and has long been one of Europeia's most consistently debated issues. Every executive election, the tickets' integration strategies draw scrutiny; we've split it into its own ministry and we've introduced scheme after scheme. Clearly as a region we're very conscious of the necessity of integration, and of ongoing efforts to increase its returns. And as with any topic of such importance, favoured approaches vary wildly, with firm believers that a government-led integration effort is doomed to be ineffective, and towards the other end of the scale those who propose fully-fledged welcoming and orientation systems.
How are we doing so far? A fuller understanding of how well our current resources work can help inform future integration plans; to that end, I spoke to four of our relatively new members (across a range of join dates) about their early experiences in Europeia. As a note, I chose to conduct individual interviews with each person so as to tailor my questions to their specific situation and get a personal take, as opposed to creating a poll I could distribute more widely. This is therefore a minuscule sample size and the intention is for it to serve as a source of feedback and ideas instead of statistical guidance.
All the interviewees joined the forum via the World Factbook Entry (WFE); their responses indicated that it was noticeable and a clear next step after moving a nation in. Navigating the forums upon joining was manageable for all of them. A common theme, however, was that the citizenship application area doesn't especially jump out for someone who has just joined the forum. The two actively looking to apply for citizenship easily found the relevant threads (one navigating the forum, one through the WFE), but those who at first were not did not see them, leading to a lack of any immediate sense of where to go next. This could be a key stage where we may be losing out on potential citizens. It ties in with suggestions made during discussions surrounding the recent presidential election that newcomers to the forum need to be presented with a simpler and more obvious path to citizenship, whether that's a reduced initial view of the forum as proposed by Mr. Verteger, or clearer directions about where to look.
Another informative result was newcomers' willingness to read and engage with passive resources. All respondents read through at least some sections of the Newcomers' Handbook after joining, and one read through Europeian law too; they each reported feeling that they got from it a decent understanding of how Europeia functions and what it has to offer. This could be encouraging for the Ministry of Interior's new job quiz, a version of which was trialled during the Euro Job Fair. Joining ministries mostly seemed to come about from a combination of research or browsing the employment areas, and recommendations in Discord.
Possibly one of the most important ways to ensure citizens stay active in the region is social engagement. While all four respondents mentioned a sense of difficulty or intimidation with engaging in social conversation at first, which is to be expected, a couple spoke about the feeling of not understanding ongoing conversations and being intimidated by the length of time and experience others have in the region. Only one person had somebody reach out to them in Direct Messages either, although two others talked about receiving telegrams upon their arrival, which made them feel welcomed. Whether or not direct outreach programs to greet newcomers would be effective upon successful implementation, any efforts to enact them up until now do not seem to have yielded many results.
Culminating in his election on July 25, President Sopo ran on a platform pledging “a holistic approach to integration” and the implementation of a “Welcome Wagon” program to guide new Europeians through the stages of engagement with the community. According to his first presidential update to the region, planning is underway; the remainder of the term will reveal whether it can break new ground in Europeian integration.
