Say no more.

Important to bear in mind that its not all students doing this, and the problem isn't that they are students, but that they are a group of largely uncontrolled teenagers whose parents have dumped in Malta as its cheap and safe.

Attracting students to Malta has many potential positives - ideally they are off season customers, interested in learning. The people described in the article are neither of these. Malta shouldn't become a creche for European parents who want to dump their kids for a few weeks in the summer.

true the student population is no doubt growing each year, they were not so bad when looked after by host families but unfortunately of late some of the struggling hotels have welcomed them with open arms, they are turning into teenage creches which are a good cheap alternative for the working parents but obviously with no adult guidance they will run riot. this is a massive problem and needs adressing soon before its too late for the Maltese tourist trade.

also not all the students are teenagers - Malta has a growing reputation in Asia with middle-aged people as a great place to learn English. They come off season, and have plenty of money - just what Malta needs - rather than drunken teenagers. The problem is, in alot of Europe, the reputation of Malta is exactly that - a place for a holiday in the sun with lots of cheap alcohol, not as an upmarket location.

well at least gozo and the south side of malta are in general not affected by these problems, yet!. but all will be tarred with the same brush whatever and tourism will eventually decline.

fortunately, its difficult for it to happen in Gozo due to a lack of 1 * hotels, plus the language schools that are in Gozo attract the "right sort" of pupils.

Big generalisation coming.... the sort of students who are a problem are not attracted to Gozo, but to the bright neon lights of Paceville

Hello all, this is not a new thing I put in my report for our summer holiday 2006 this was one of the things that will keep me away from Malta, I also remember way back in 1998 again on summer holiday in the Park hotel Russian Students running up and down at all hours of the night banging on doors and getting peoples backs up and the management turning a blind eye to it.
These sort of things do put people off places and as for cheap drinks well they may have cheap drinks in say a local bar, but Malta's tourist bars are no cheaper than most of Europe, unless you call one glass of Coke and four straws a cheap night ( again as I put once before )

Soon to be in Mallorca,
Dave

I have an apartment about 2-3 mins walk from Paceville. I have no problem with the vast majority of Students. A handful make some small trouble but it's way less than the youth I see in the UK.

The students bring life to the areas they frequent and most I've come across and spoken to are very pleasant. That's also one of the problems, no one seems to want to engage in a conversation with them. They come from all around Europe and other parts of the world, it's very interesting to chat with alot of them.

It's far better to have a youthful atmosphere than that of ageing retirees as you find for example, in Cyprus - I would never go back there.

Many of the students have quite a bit of money to spend but not on the things the over 50's appreciate but it still goes into the economy. Many of them come from well off families, the less well off families certainly would not send their kids abroad to learn English, they have other priorities in life.

It's one of the reasons I bought an apartment in Portomaso, because of the great atmosphere in the surrounding areas, not only Paceville but the whole of Sliema

well said you must be truly open minded if you think the swelling population of students is helping Malta in general to prosper, I know they are here to learn primarily but they also know how to party, if you read their forums they say where their priorities lie. Correct paceville is on top. you are welcome to them and if they start to invade my area i,ll be off to gozo, next ferry.

Well after being once and not enjoying the experience because of the horrendous amount of dog excrement we encountered we have given it a miss for several years but we have over the last few months decided to give Malta another chance.

BUT reading the posts regarding students we have reconsidered and have decided to give it a miss again.

Thats 2 reasonably well-heeled tourists who wont be visiting and spending money on the islands. I wonder how many others feel the same?

Patka

Well, I've been visiting Malta 3-4 times per year for the last 4 years and I haven't seen a problem with dogs. There's more of a problem with this in the UK, Italy and Spanish islands from my experience.

There also seem to be record numbers of visitors to Malta over the last few years, so I suppose that speaks for itself

come come you cant use doggie doos as an excuse, you havent lived till you skidded a few yards on one, especially in your open toed sandles

Well we stayed at the Marina in Sliema a couple of years ago and the place was awash with foreign students! I have to say that most of them were generally well behaved but there was the odd incident, like objects being thrown down onto our balcony. According to the Times of Malta article regarding the problems these students are causing, things seem to be getting worse and I have to ask myself do we want to spend our hols that cost us a lot of hard earned cash in a hotel with other folks often unsupervised and potentially unrully kids?? We have not returned to the Marina!

Although we love to visit Malta, we are more likely to prefer to do so when students are not there!! Perhaps Sliema2 or someone else who might know when the Island is normally relatively student free, could furnish me with these details? Is there a published list of hotels which accept students and which don't that could be referred to?

We have always avoided many infamous holiday destinations in the Med because of the bad behaviour of young adults (often British!!) since that's not the kind of holiday we would enjoy. I just hope the problems with foreign students in Malta can be sorted or I can envisage that there will be a lot of regulars looking elsewhere!

Trev

Basically, the students will be in Malta between July and August with some arriving in the last week of June and leaving 1st week of September. To be honest, these times are the general school holiday times throughout Europe and it's the hottest time in Malta. If you have school aged kids, it's hard to avoid this period but it will be the same wherever you go in Europe anyway.

Therefore, you still have around 10 months of student free time and these months avoid the hottest (and most uncomfortable for many) months of the year.

With regards to regulars, I'm a regular and so are a number of my friends and we like the youthful atmosphere the majority of the students bring to parts of the island. It's actually one of the reasons why we like to pop over for a couple of trips during July/August time. It's great to see a contrast in these areas throughout the year.

Hi openminded,

Thanks for the info. Probably best to keep away from the Sliema area during July & August.

By the way do you reckon families generally allow their own kids to run riot and do the kind of things reported in the Times of Malta article - I don't think so!

Trev

well, some families do and some don't as in every other country but i'm openminded about it

Well I have just returned from a two week break in Mellieha, I was a little concerned during the first week when I noticed that students were staying in the Pergola Hotel, which happens to be quite a good hotel. However I have to say that these students who were French, behaved impeccably. They were a credit to their parents and country.

It will be likened to the arsenal f/c. one day the french, the next the world. BEWARE.

We satyed at the Coastline last August, and found we had a few Italian students; they were mainly OK, but one lot did the usual, banging doors, shouting down the corridor, etc. The crunch came one night with 14 of them (we counted) sitting IN the corridor having a loud discussion/argument. Cue 4 or 5 people at reception complaining to the duty manager. We were told the hotel manager would deal with it in the morning. We went off to Valletta, and came back to find a note from the manager pushed under our door - he'd chucked some of the students out! The rest of the students were very quiet from then on, although we (and others) did get some dirty looks from them - did we care?
So it seems some hotels do listen to their guests - well done to the Coastline.