First Year Students and Seniors, Here’s a Chance to Tell BU What You Think of It
Does BU provide useful help with your learning? How often do you learn things that change your understanding of an idea? What nonacademic activities, on campus and off, are you involved in? The University wants to know. Photo by iStock/izusek
First Year Students and Seniors, Here’s a Chance to Tell BU What You Think of It
Online survey will let the University assess the strengths and identify areas of improvement in the undergraduate student experience
First-year students and seniors, now’s your chance to turn the tables and give Boston University a grade.
Does the University provide useful help with your learning? How often do you learn things that change your understanding of an idea? Do you contribute often to class discussions and use ideas from different courses on your assignments? How many times do you talk to people with different backgrounds or political beliefs? What nonacademic activities, on campus and off, are you involved in?
The National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), available online from February 27 to April 3, gives Terriers the chance to let University leaders know their take on classwork, interactions on campus, and BU’s learning environment.
The University will email the survey link to eligible students. Those who complete it will earn $5 in Convenience Points; those among the first 100 to complete the survey will receive double that value in points.
The survey “is an essential tool for the University to better understand the undergraduate student experience,” says Christine McGuire, vice president and associate provost for enrollment and student administration. BU and outside evaluators used the survey during the University’s last 10-year accreditation, she says, as “student engagement is critically important to capture, and the NSSE survey is one of the best ways for us to do so.”
The 2016 survey and students’ feedback about the pros and cons of the academic program guided officials in developing the Hub, the University-wide general education curriculum put in place in 2018.
Denise Mooney, associate vice president for enrollment and student administration, says the questions this year will be similar to those of past years, with the addition of some about “experiences with information literacy.”
“This is really more of an effort to look at responses longitudinally,” Mooney says, “and how they might change with BU’s investments in academic advising, implementation of the Hub, etc.,” even when specific changes aren’t forthcoming.
The NSSE is done every year, but BU participates biennially to allow time for reviewing the results and implementing any necessary improvements. The survey is run by the Indiana School of Education, and more than 600 colleges and universities are participating this year, according to the school.
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