This year has felt like many years all in one, with the ongoing Covid pandemic and the invasion of Ukraine at the beginning of 2022, and then the welcome yet at times overwhelming challenge of getting back to our normal pace of life.
That is reflected in the top 15 most-read stories we’ve published this year: our coverage of the arrival of Ukrainian refugees in Groningen, protests against the war, and ways to support them all made it into our top 15.
Rising energy prices, and initiatives to make them more affordable (and protests to ensure that) also mattered to you, as did Covid policy changes and access to vaccines also mattered to you.
For all international residents living in the north, stories public transport news, coverage of the still persistent earthquakes in the region, the ongoing struggle for fair housing for foreign students, and access to Dutch language courses always struck a chord.
Here at the Northern Times, this was a year of new developments too: we expanded our staff, hosted several talented and hard-working interns and columnists, changed our Instagram style and added Ukrainian translations (thanks to a small group of dedicated Ukrainian-speaking volunteers).
The Northern Times will be taking a hard-earned holiday break from 21 December through 4 January. If there’s any major breaking news we will keep you posted.
But in the meantime, we wanted to take this downtime to look back at our top stories of 2022. Thank you for reading out stories, following us on social media and your support – see you in 2023!
