FACULTY/STAFF > DEPARTMENTS & OFFICES >
INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH > NATIONAL SURVEY OF STUDENT ENGAGEMENT(NSSE)
National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE)
NSSE is a
college student survey that assesses the extent to which students engage in
educational practices associated with high levels of learning and
development. Per its sponsoring
organization, “NSSE was specifically designed to assess the extent to which
students are engaged in effective educational practices and what they gain from
their college experiences. Voluminous research on college student development
shows that the time and energy students devote to educationally purposeful
activities is the single best predictor of their learning and personal
development. Therefore, the main content of the NSSE instrument represents
student behaviors that are highly correlated with many desirable learning and
personal development outcomes of college”. NSSE has become
an important assessment tool in higher education. In 2018 over 500 colleges, including RMU,
participated in NSSE. About 290,000
college freshmen and seniors took the NSSE in spring 2018 including 280 RMU
freshmen and 350 RMU seniors. The 2018
administration of NSSE was RMU’s seventh participation in this survey which is
administered in the spring of even-numbered years. RMU’s 2018
results by NSSE category reveal few statistically meaningful differences from
the results of comparison group colleges.
Those categories include (level of) academic challenge, learning with
peers, experiences with faculty, and campus environment. Comparison of RMU’s results with those
recorded by the highest-performing NSSE colleges shows that they outstrip RMU
in categories pertaining to learning strategies and the quality of
student-faculty interaction although the degree of these differences is
narrowing. RMU compares favorably with
these high-performing institutions in quantitative literacy, collaborative
learning, diversity and the supportiveness of RMU’s campus environment. At the
individual question level, when compared with other colleges and universities
RMU shows strength in participation in student organizations, internships,
attainment of presentation and speaking skills, and participation in learning
activities that take place outside the classroom. RMU was weaker than the comparison group in
development of values and ethics, imparting writing skills and requiring
students to synthesize information from multiple classes and sources in order
to address academic challenges and problems.
RMU’s results were not significantly different on many other NSSE
questions that fall between these two extremes.
RMU administrators
are examining the NSSE results (both aggregate and at the departmental levels)
to seek opportunities to improve students’ RMU experience and to address any
weaknesses identified via the survey.
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