2008 National Survey of Student Engagement Explores Variations in Educational Quality

The 2008 report from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), Promoting Engagement for All Students: The Imperative to Look Within, finds that the quality of undergraduate education varies much more within a single institution than between institutions—in most cases, more than 90 percent of variations in educational quality is within an institution, not between institutions. For this reason, the report authors strongly recommend that administrators disaggregate their institution’s data to get the clearest picture of student engagement. The report emphasizes that lists and rankings can be misleading and are not accurate portraits of educational quality.

The report also presents data on online learners, student success in the first year, and how writing matters in student engagement.  The data from NSSE 2008 is drawn from almost 380,000 randomly sampled students from 722 U.S. four-year colleges and universities. The survey was administered in spring 2008.

FINDINGS

Online Learners

• For both first-year and seniors students, online learners were more likely to very often participate in intellectually challenging activities and to very often participate in discussions that enhanced their understanding of different cultures.
• Online learners are as likely as their classroom-based peers to believe the campus is very supportive of their academic success.
• Relative to classroom-based learners, online learners in both age groups were more likely to report engaging in deep approaches to learning (higher-order thinking, integrative learning, and reflexive learning).

First-year Success

• Underprepared students (defined in NSSE as those who took at least two developmental-level courses in college) were significantly less engaged than highly prepared students.
• Highly prepared students were less likely than their underprepared peers to use a campus learning lab (24 percent versus 38 percent) or ask an instructor for help on an assignment (45 percent versus 54 percent).
• Eighty-five percent of first-year students intended to graduate from their current institution.
• Student levels of disposition toward engagement when entering college were not always strong predictors of future engagement.

Writing Matters

• First-year students wrote an average of 92 pages and seniors wrote an average of 146 pages per academic year.
• Amount of writing was positively correlated with engagement—students who wrote more were also more engaged in active and collaborative learning
• Seventy-five percent of first-year students and 63 percent of seniors indicated that they received professor feedback on “some,” “most,” or “all” of their drafts.

The entire report may be viewed online.

DID YOU KNOW?

• One out of five first-year students reported that they frequently came to class without completing readings or assignments.
• Faculty who encourage students to write multiple drafts of assignments are also likely to emphasize deep methods of learning.
• Among first-generation students, about half of both first-year students and seniors did not participate in any cocurricular activities.