Learning and Teaching Committee

 

Subject:        National Student Survey (NSS)

 

Origin:           Robert Bowyer, Jennifer Nutkins; HERO updates

 

 

Learning and Teaching Committee is invited to note developments that have taken place in relation to the National Student Survey since the previous meeting and to consider what actions the University should put in hand to respond to the publication of the results.

 

LU response

  • At the time of the previous LTC meeting there was concern that a technical problem had prevented many Loughborough students from opening the online survey.  The problem was vigorously pursued with Ipsos UK (the company conducting the survey) and was eventually resolved; the PVC(T) also wrote to HEFCE to alert them to the difficulties that Loughborough had experienced.
  • Loughborough’s response rate was regularly monitored and by the end of March, compared to universities with a similar number of finalists, the University was reported to be in the top 50%.
  • The University’s final response rate was 75.08% overall. 
  • At a subject area level within the University, Mathematical Sciences had the lowest response rate of 67.74% and Computer Science the highest rate of 85.31%.
  • A press release has been issued stating that across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, the NSS has achieved a 60% response rate, which is 10% higher than HE sector organisations agreed would be necessary to ensure statistically reliable results. 
  • Information obtained from Ipsos UK indicates that the Loughborough response rate was the 8th highest. 

 

Publication of results

  • HEFCE has consulted institutions on the subject structure for publishing data from the NSS and will primarily use a classification based on 38 subjects (see separate paper on TQI web-site).
  • It is anticipated that HEIs will be able to preview their own NSS data on the TQI backend site by mid July 2005.
  • Results of the survey are to be published on the TQI site in September 2005.
  • Publication of the results will be accompanied by a UK-wide campaign to publicise the TQI site.
  • Institutions will be able to provide a single commentary on their NSS results on the TQI site and a link to this will be provided on the TQI site wherever any NSS results about that institution appear.  Whilst it will be possible to draft and upload the commentary prior to the September launch, this will be without access to other institutions’ results. 
  • Additional feedback will be available to institutions and Students’ Unions from September 2005 via the Ipsos NSS extranet.  The nature of this feedback was discussed at consultation events in January but might include, for example:
    • Results broken down by demographic and other variables not available on the TQI site
    • Results broken down according to institutions’ departmental/programme structures
    • Access to the qualitative feedback provided by students at the end of the questionnaire.

There are data protection and freedom of information issues.

 

2006

  • Preparations are already in train for repeating the NSS in 2006. 

 

Issues for Departments/Faculties/Learning and Teaching Committee to Consider

 

  • There is an immediate need to be prepared to respond to queries about NSS results from prospective students and, if the results are good, to think about how best to use them to promote Loughborough. This is particularly important given the increase in tuition fees for 2006 entry and that the results may be published shortly before the September Open Days.

 

  • Depending on the nature of the results and any unpublished information which is made available to us, there may be issues for Learning and Teaching Committee in relation to the quality of provision in the University as a whole or in particular subject areas.

 

  • The Registry will alert TQI contacts to the results at the earliest opportunity in July/August with information about how the data is structured so that Departments can understand which programmes the data relates to and contribute information to the institutional statement on the results. The latter will initially be written without knowledge of the results of other HEIs and we may wish to update it once the site goes live.

 

  • We will want to analyse competitor results but it is desirable to avoid duplication of effort between the centre and departments. NSS results are likely to be used for League Tables and a competitor analysis will give us a first indication of the possible impact though we are unlikely to know the methodology to be used until the tables are published.

 

RAB/JCN

240505