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 2012 546 colleges, including RMU, participated in NSSE.  About 285,000 college freshmen and seniors took the NSSE in spring 2012 including 180 RMU freshmen and 448 RMU seniors.  The 2012 administration of NSSE was RMU’s fourth participation in this survey which is administered in the spring of even-numbered years.  RMU is preparing to participate in the 2014 administration of NSSE in March and April 2014.

RMU’s results, when compared with the colleges in its Carnegie Class and for all colleges participating in the 2012 NSSE, show no statistically meaningful deviation from those of the comparison colleges.  While those results are encouraging, RMU also looks for ways to measure itself against more stringent benchmarks.  NSSE also provides comparison data for colleges whose results are in the top half of all colleges administering the survey.  Use of that comparison group shows that RMU is attaining about the same level of performance in 3 of 5 categories for freshmen and 2 of 5 categories for seniors.  In one category, Supportive Campus Environment, RMU is performing at the same level for its freshmen as the top 10% of all NSSE participants.

RMU’s 2012 NSSE results have been shared with its senior administrators, Deans and with all RMU faculty during their spring 2013 convocation.  RMU administrators and faculty are examining the results (both aggregate and at the departmental levels) to seek opportunities to improve students’ RMU experience.