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Entrance to university does not automatically lead to high academic engagement and success, and there may be individual differences in student engagement. In the present study, university students' (N=668) academic engagement and disengagement profiles, and the differences between them in terms of academic achievement, were investigated. Students from introductory courses were classified by Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) into homogenous groups having similar patterns according to the following variables: study engagement, study-related exhaustion, lack of interest, lack of self-regulation, and uncertainty of one's career choice. Four groups of students were identified: engaged, disengaged, undecided, and alienated. Engaged students received the highest grades, with disengaged and undecided students performing most poorly. In addition, the profiles were related to the behavioral indicators of engagement (i.e., ECTS credits). Even after two years of studying, engaged students were performing better than disengaged students. The study's implications for both research and practice are discussed.

This study compares university students’ approaches to learning and experiences with the teaching–learning environment in general and during online studying as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. It examines students’ learning profiles and how students with different learning profiles experienced the teaching–learning environment during COVID-19 as well as their approaches to learning and study-related burnout in general. The participants were 665 first- and second-year students. The profiles were examined using K-means cluster analyses and the differences in learning profiles using one-way ANOVA and the Tuckey Test. The results show changes in students’ approaches to learning and their experiences with the teaching–learning environment and study-related burnout within the different profiles when comparing a normal situation to the COVID-19 pandemic. We suggest that changes in study-related burnout can be different among different study profiles. The results imply that students with a fragmented knowledge base and difficulties in managing time and effort would require special attention in online teaching situations.

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This study examines, using a cross-sectional approach, the digital competence of academic teachers at a time when teaching shifted to digital distance learning at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Teachers from different academic fields at a large multidisciplinary Finnish university (N = 265) responded to a questionnaire about the purposes for which they use digital tools in teaching, how they evaluated their competence at distance teaching during the lockdown of March-May 2020 and their beliefs about distance teaching. The respondents used digital tools in teaching mostly for delivering information. According to their evaluations, their competence in distance teaching increased during the early stages of COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, but their beliefs about distance teaching did not relate to the feelings of competence. Respondents with no experience in distance teaching before the lockdown evaluated their competence as having increased more than did respondents with previous experience. The implications of the findings for understanding competence development are then discussed.