National survey aims to improve campus

     GCSU is in a monetary chain to discover how engaged students are at GCSU. GCSU hired the National Survey of Student of Engagement (NSSE) to conduct a survey of GCSU seniors and freshmen examining the level of student involvement. In return, the school will reward chosen participants, to be decided at random, $50 for completing the survey.
     NSSE has been around since 1998 and over 700 colleges are involved in the survey this spring.
     “NSSE is designed to give institutions a way to determine how involved students are in their coursework and socially around campus,” Director of Institutional Research Edward Hale said. “It is a good way to understand freshman and seniors. For freshman, it measures their transition to college life ,and it gives a better understanding of the impact of programs available at college. For seniors, it examines what they have done since they have been here, and it gives us the opportunity to compare senior responses with that of the freshman.”
     Furthermore, according to Hale, the survey is a important measure of the two pillars stressed by GCSU: getting students more involved in the residential campus and meeting all needs in enabling education to be successful.
     “The survey essentially covers how active students were in classes as well out of class experiences,” Hale said. “It helps GCSU create a situation where information can be applied. Lecturing, to me, is just hearing it and writing it down. We want students to be engaged and make the information theirs.”
Senior rhetoric major Nichol Herman believes the survey can be a helpful instrument in enhancing this campus.
     “As a senior, you don’t realize how important the little things are until the last couple of months before graduation,” Herman said. “The survey can help find ways to gear more activities towards specifics classes. We need to work on the school as a whole and create more activities outside of Greek life.”
     Along with in-campus benefits, the survey also gives GCSU the opportunity to compare to other institutions in state, as all schools in Georgia are participating. GCSU will compare the results to all public liberal arts universities in the country and see if GCSU’s approval rate is as high as other institutions.  
     “With this we can compare what the school can do to improve communication and eliminate distracters, things that kept students from participating,” Hale said. “It gives a better picture of what life is like for students right now.”
     Participants are chosen on a random sample within enrolled seniors and freshman at GCSU. Sophomores and juniors will be included in the study when the survey is done again in two years. The system works off a cohort analysis where freshman and senior classes are paired together. As cohorts cycle through, their answers will be compared to incoming classes.
     The results will be posted on the institutional research website so that it may be transparent to faculty. Individual names are anonymous. The information collected in the survey is compiled aggregately not individually. NSSE is contractually obligated from selling or disclosing any names.
     The benefits of the survey are as transparent as the results. GCSU is issuing an incentive of $50 to students that complete the survey. NSSE will draw names at random and send those names to the university. From there, $50 checks will be given to the winners. Two winners are expected to be rewarded this week and two others will be rewarded over the summer, as NSSE has extended the survey to last throughout the semester.
     The school is investigating other incentives.
     “We are restricted with what we can do with state money,” Hale said. “We are looking at working with campus agencies to create technology incentives.”
     The survey on average takes eight and half minutes to complete, and while that may seem long to some people, Hale believes the costs balance out. 
     “The burden is balanced by valuable information,” Hale said. “It is not cheap from anyone’s perspective. It costs between $6,000 and $9,000 to do but it is a small amount to pay to know the students are well served.”
Senior math major Jessica Wehner completed the survey and found it to be a valuable resource.
     “The survey was very thorough and asked some important questions that I think can only be answered by students, so I imagine if someone actually analyzes the results, then the survey would be valuable as an indicator of where improvements need to be made,” Wehner said.
     Wehner also gave suggestions to improve student participation.
     “Well, I almost ignored the request to take the survey, but I got a few more emails telling me that it was important so eventually I decided someone must really want my input, and that’s what made me take the 15 minutes or so to fill it out,” Wehener said. “I guess if it can be shown how important it is or proven that it is useful, then that would motivate more students.”
As far as the future goes, the information attained holds a high bearing on GCSU advancement.
     “There will be a tremendous amount of discussion of where we are headed in the future,” Hale said. “Once the survey is completed, I will schedule a meeting with the president, so that they will know where we are going, and things GCSU needs to address.”
     Hale is excited about the data and what the school can do with it.
     “The data will not sit on a shelf,” Hale said. “I want it to come alive and breathe and force people to believe in our school. Institutional research is also looking into a creating some climate or satisfaction surveys to narrow down the information even more.”

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Mar 14 2008. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry