Courtesy of National Survey of Student Engagement Data Reports
Many of you have probably seen Moodle notices and fliers around campus about something called NSSE. The National Survey of Student Engagement – NSSE – is the most widely used national student survey of college students. Connecticut College is now administering it to all our full-time, degree-seeking students. The Center for Postsecondary Research at Indiana University developed the survey, and since 2020, 1,188 institutions have participated. On Feb. 21, Conn students received an email invitation from NSSE to participate in the survey, and reminders will be sent until the survey closes in mid-April.
We realize filling out online questionnaires is probably not anyone’s idea of a great time. Still, we view student surveys as a crucial part of shared governance, allowing student feedback to be systematically collected and communicated to those at the College who work with students in the academic and social aspects of their college careers. Our office is by no means the only office on campus that conducts surveys, but we help administer some of the major ones, and we work hard to ensure that we get good response rates so that the results are valid and representative. Then, we work hard to communicate the results to the campus community in a timely, clear fashion so the College’s leaders can act on the issues students have voiced.
To thank participants for their time taking the survey this year, we’ll be holding a drawing of the names of survey completers to win one of 20 Conn sweatshirts we’re giving away.
Why should you complete NSSE?
Conn has administered NSSE 17 times since 2000, and the results have been used in various ways to help College leaders understand our students’ academic and social experiences. We hope most students will make their voices heard this year by taking 15-20 minutes to complete the survey. NSSE average response rates at institutions with fewer than 2,500 students have declined in recent years, as seen in the graph below.
Despite this national trend, Conn has maintained a response rate above the national average, except in 2014 and 2015, and our average response rate over the last ten rounds is 49%. We want to maintain a response rate above 50%, so we can say the majority of our students participated in the survey.
Why is a high response rate – and thus your participation – important? Survey research theory shows that the higher our response rates, the more likely the responses we gather from the sample of students who respond will represent the underlying population across key demographics like gender, race/ethnicity, and other demographic variables. If we don’t hear from many students in particular subgroups, their experiences won’t be reflected in the final results. Given the events on campus last year, we’re particularly interested in hearing from a wide range of students on the set of NSSE questions related to inclusiveness and engagement with cultural diversity, which will function as a mini-campus climate survey for us. Finally, while NSSE is usually only administered to first-year students and seniors, we’re surveying all students this year to get a complete snapshot of the student body.
What kinds of questions does NSSE ask?
NSSE originated as a way to learn about what students actually do in college – in their courses and their extracurricular activities – so that we measure student experiences and outcomes better than, for example, the U.S. News rankings do (which look mainly at the credentials students enter with, whether they persist and graduate, and how much money an institution has). To understand Conn’s strengths as an institution, we need to know how frequently our students participate in a variety of intellectually enriching experiences like writing papers, doing group projects, meeting with faculty members outside of class, and participating in high-impact experiences like internships, study away, fieldwork, honors study, and culminating senior projects.
NSSE questions thus ask respondents how often they have done a wide range of things in their courses and with fellow students in the current school year. This could include whether they have done or plan to do various out-of-class activities, how much time they spend studying and working, or what they think of the campus climate and their overall satisfaction with it. Finally, it asks various demographic questions to check for variation among the experiences and viewpoints of different kinds of students.
How have the survey results been used at Conn in the past?
Conn has administered NSSE many times since 2000. While the results have not single handedly or immediately led to creating any particular program or experience, they have shaped how faculty, staff, and administrators understand our students’ experiences. Results from the early 2000s indicated that first-year students were not feeling as engaged with or academically challenged by their coursework, and this helped create the rationale for the creation of the First-Year Seminar program in 2005.
NSSE was also part of a large 2007-2010 study we participated in on how students acquire a liberal arts education at Conn and several other institutions. The results showed better learning outcomes correlated with high faculty expectations, contact with faculty outside of class, coursework requiring higher‐order thinking, and diversity inside and outside the classroom.
The results also showed variation in the extent to which students participated in the best academic opportunities Conn offers (like certificate programs), which informed the creation of Connections and Integrative Pathways to give more students these experiences. Most recently, NSSE data indicating that students wanted the College to emphasize co-curricular and social opportunities led to a strategic plan to increase funding for clubs and organizations and a more robust schedule of social events.
In short, NSSE lets students have their voices heard, and the results are used in many ways by College leaders to improve the student experience at Conn. We strongly encourage you to participate in the survey, honestly and candidly, making this a high-quality set of results for us to work with in order to make positive changes to student life on campus.
If you have questions or comments, feel free to contact us at ir@conncoll.edu.
