Survey looks to gauge students' college experiences

If you received an e-mail from the chancellor's office in the past few weeks, don't worry. You're probably not in any trouble.\nIn fact, your input on the survey linked to the e-mail will help improve the University.\nMore than 7,000 freshmen and seniors at IU are chosen randomly each year to participate in the National Survey of Student Engagement, a document that questions students on their classroom and social experiences.\n"It's taken seriously," said Rachel Boon, IU research analyst for budgetary information. "I know that several departments come back the next year and ask for the results."\nFeedback from the survey is mostly used by deans to better shape courses, but RPS also analyzes the data to see how academic experience differs between students living on and off campus.\nOne person very interested in the results of this year's survey is first-year School of Journalism Dean Bradley Hamm.\n"We've actually not used the data, but we will," Hamm said. "The great part of the NSSE data is that it shows you what happens to students over four years. You can study what changes to make in a program to make it better."\nThe survey is given to hundreds of universities throughout the country each year, but Hamm said he feels it may not be used to its maximum potential at IU.\n"The NSSE data offers all universities across the nation a remarkable tool," he said. "Perhaps people at IU don't realize how other universities use this. The university I came from looked forward to getting this data."\nHamm was previously an associate dean at Elon University in North Carolina.\nIn comparing IU's responses on the survey to other large research institutions, IU appears to offer more challenging course work.\n"For reading and writing we tend to do better," Boon said. "Our students tend to write a lot more."\nEarly results also look optimistic for the School of Journalism.\n"Our initial look shows students scoring higher on the questions we want them to score higher on," Hamm said. "It reveals our program is challenging."\nOne problem with the survey, however, is actually getting students to respond. Those who don't take the survey in the first e-mail will get several more reminders between now and the end of March, and even then they have until at least June to complete it.\nTiffany Yoder, a senior majoring in journalism, said she ignored the first e-mail she received.\n"I didn't think anyone would actually pay attention to it or read it," she said. "But if they're actually going to be paying attention, I'll probably fill it out. It just seems like a lot of the time no one really pays much attention to what students have to say"