Volume 6, Issue 1 September 2006

Web Site Resources
Moving from Paper-Based to Web-Based Administration
Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement: 2007 Launch
NSSE in the News
Law School Survey of Student Engagement: Registration
Featured School: Northern Arizona University
Southern CT State Hosts Fall Regional NSSE Users Workshop - Oct. 19-20!
NSSE Roadshow

Web Site Resources

www.nsse.iub.edu

The NSSE Web site offers a variety of instructive resources. Amongst them are tools that assist institutions in preparing for survey administration, conducting additional data analyses, and using schools’ findings productively in order to improve the quality of the undergraduate experience. Please take some time to explore the different areas of the NSSE Web site at www.nsse.iub.edu. Highlighted below are several of the Web-based resources that will guide you in using your NSSE data.

Tools and Tips

This resource is available on the NSSE Institute Web site, via Reports and Services.

Accreditation Toolkits

Toolkits map specific items from the NSSE instrument to each regional accreditation board's standards. Individual NSSE items can be used as evidence of specific standards, and overall NSSE findings as well as benchmark scores can be used to support and document institutional improvement efforts.

Using NSSE Data

Examples, based on the collective experience of NSSE schools, provide a broad overview of the possibilities for institutions to use their data in meaningful ways. Check out this informative site at: www.nsse.iub.edu/institute/index.cfm?view=tools/index.

A Pocket Guide to Choosing a College

NSSE revised and updated its pocket guide to exploring colleges, and a copy is available on our Web site. The improved version, "A Pocket Guide to Choosing a College: Are You Asking the Right Questions," was created as part of an ongoing public awareness campaign to refocus the national conversation about what constitutes quality in the college experience. It is intended to get prospective college students and their parents to start thinking more about these types of questions during the college decision making process. Find a copy on our Web site at: www.nsse.iub.edu/html/pocket_guide_intro.cfm.

NSSE Users ListServ

Last spring we created a Listserv in order to facilitate communication among NSSE users. If you’re looking for advice from other NSSE users, consider posting a question to the list. To register, visit this Web page www.nsse.iub.edu/listserv.

Moving from Paper-Based to Web-Based Administration

Web-based surveys continue to gain credibility and improve response rates. They are being used more and more frequently to capture the thoughts and experiences of a technologically adept generation. Web-only mode is quickly becoming the preference for the majority of participating NSSE institutions. Some schools, however, prefer the paper mode for these reasons: (a) the institution is new and prefers to transition to the web-based survey gradually; (b) the institution does not administer institutional email addresses for its students (and the web-based email addresses that students provide are not always reliable); and (c) the school’s undergraduate population may be small enough for a paper survey to be most effective. Some institutions that have administered paper mode in the past have transitioned to Web+ mode, an option to be explained in greater detail below (See "What works best"?).

How is NSSE administered?

Upon the survey’s inception in 2000, 276 institutions participated in NSSE. Last spring, 557 institutions participated, enabling us to provide rich data for institutions seeking to understand the engagement of their students in learning and campus activities. As NSSE has evolved, so has its administration. In 2000, two modes were available -- paper and Web-only. In the 2004 administration, some institutions encouraged us to introduce a mixed-mode approach, which became "Web+" -- an alternative for schools that would like to conduct a Web-based survey with a larger sample size, but are uncertain whether they have an adequate technology infrastructure and a student body that can be effectively contacted via available e-mail addresses. Today, all three modes are available in our effort to meet your needs.

Table 1 summarizes mode use from 2000 through 2006. Paper distribution has declined sharply with Web-only based administration increasing significantly. Web+ continues to be a widely used option, often as institutions transition from paper to Web-only mode.

Year	Total	# Paper	% Paper	# Web-Only	% Web-Only	# Web+	% Web+
2000	276	223	81%	53	19%	NA	NA
2001	321	261	81%	60	19%	NA	NA
2002	366	245	67%	121	33%	NA	NA
2003	437	316	73%	119	27%	NA	NA
2004	473	200	42%	175	37%	98	21%
2005	529	172	33%	168	31%	189	36%
2006	557	119	21%	253	45%	185	33%

Administration of NSSE Instrument Categorized by Mode

What works best?

NSSE Client Services staff are often asked, "What mode works best?" This is difficult to answer in light of the many factors that influence response rates. Many participants appreciate the benefits of a larger sample provided through Web-only administration. It is more cost-effective as institutions reach a wider audience with no increase in cost. Visit the costs section of the FAQ to get more information on how sample size increases with different modes of administration.

Many Web+ institutions eventually transition to Web-only administration. One might consider the Web+ mode to be the "training wheels" approach to Web-only mode; after a while, it comes time to determine if the wheels are still necessary. Web+ increases an institution’s sample size, and the fee for this mode remains consistent with that of paper mode.

Some institutions enjoy robust technological infrastructures, and have better access to students through e-mail. Schools still using the paper-only administration may not be confident in their email contacts for students, or may believe students are less inclined to respond to surveys sent over e-mail. You best know your institution and the culture of students, so ultimately you are the best judge as to the optimal mode of administration.

Please contact NSSE with further questions and/or if you are seeking advisement on administration mode selection. You may reach us via phone at 812.856.5824 or via email at nsse@indiana.edu.

Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement: 2007 Launch

The Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement (BCSSE, pronounced "Bessie"), will officially launch in 2007. Field tested the past two years, BCSSE is a companion instrument to NSSE that measures entering first-year students’ high school academic and co-curricular involvement, as well as the importance that these students place on their participation in educationally purposeful activities during college. To better understand the influence of the institution on student engagement during college, it is important to measure and control for both the engagement patterns that students have established prior to entering college and the importance that they place on student engagement while in college. Standing alone, BCSSE results can be used to improve pre-college orientation and other programmatic efforts with an eye toward enhancing student engagement and learning during the first year of college. In combination with NSSE and FSSE data, BCSSE data will help institutions to assess the impact of their programmatic efforts on student success during the first year of college. What will participating institutions receive?

Within four to six weeks after completed BCSSE surveys have been returned to Indiana University, participating schools will receive an electronic report containing summary information on their entering students, a copy of the BCSSE data file, and a codebook that describes the information in the data file. For those institutions that also participate in NSSE during the same academic year, the institution will receive with their NSSE Institutional Report a combined BCSSE-NSSE summary report and a combined BCSSE-NSSE data file for students who completed both instruments.

BCSSE Quick Facts

Target. BCSSE is administered to entering first-year students only.

Administration. BCSSE may be either Web-based or paper-based (both administered by the school). The institution determines if BCSSE is administered to the entire population or a sample of entering first-year students. Also, the institution determines if selection into the sample will be determined through a random, targeted, or convenience design.

Mode. The BCSSE instrument is available in paper and Web modes. An institution must choose either the paper or Web mode for its local administration; no combination of the paper and Web modes of administration is provided to participating institutions.

Timeline. BCSSE registration will begin in January 2007 and run through the end of May 2007. Administration of the BCSSE instrument may begin at institutions as early as May and can run through late September. As noted above, BCSSE results are delivered to institutions within four to six weeks after an institution’s administration ends. For those institutions that also participate in NSSE, BCSSE student identifiers are returned to institutions to be included in their NSSE population files. A combined BCSSE-NSSE report is delivered with the NSSE Institutional Report during August of the next calendar year.

Coming This Fall

BCSSE will launch its Web site, available via www.bcsse.iub.edu, which will include:

• Results of the pilot administrations, including recent research using pilot data
• Sample reports and survey for the upcoming 2007 administration
• Tips for local administration
• Registration and cost information

NSSE in the News

The 2006 NSSE and FSSE Institutional Reports were released in August (www.nsse.iub.edu/html/institutional_reports.cfm). For the first time, these included the Benchmark Comparisons report that previously accompanied the Annual Report in late fall.

National and regional media turn to NSSE for insights into the undergraduate experience. Below are some of the major headlines from around the United States:

Washington Monthly The Washington Monthly College Guide urges schools to release their NSSE data.	9/1/2006
FOX News In response to claims of grade inflation at Ivy League Schools, George Kuh argues that well-prepared students “are going to do well in whatever setting they are.”	August/2006
Century Foundation NSSE highlighted as a means of reform for performance assessment	August/2006
Roanoke Times Director of data research at U.S. News and World Report would like to include NSSE data in its college rankings	August/2006
Newsweek “Selective schools don't systematically employ better instructional approaches than less-selective schools.”	August/2006
Delaware Online NSSE may capture aspects of the educational experience some rankings do not.	August/2006
New York Times NSSE highlighted as a “worthy effort” in measuring how students learn	August/2006
Roanoke Times Women’s college commits to remaining a single-sex institution based, in part, on NSSE findings.	August/2006
The Chronicle of Higher Education "Report Calls for New Assessment Tools, but Not Tests, to Foster Accountability” in response to potential recommendations of the Commission on the Future of Higher Education.	August/2006

Law School Survey of Student Engagement: Registration

LSSSE (Law School Survey of Student Engagement) will open for registration in October. To date, over 100 different institutions have participated in the survey, which represents over half of the law schools in the country. For additional details, please refer to the website: www.lssse.iub.edu/index.cfm

Featured School: Northern Arizona University

Northern Arizona University’s Division of Student Affairs works with several partners on campus in an effort to get the most out of their NSSE data. The Institutional Research Office extracts important information from the NSSE Institutional Report and disseminates it to colleagues in the Division of Student Affairs. The information IR provides is in an abbreviated version, with the goal of making the information as manageable as possible. Each Student Affairs department receives NSSE data and is expected to utilize it in a manner they feel most appropriate.

There are several examples of how student affairs professionals are using NSSE data. For instance, the NAU first-year taskforce is a joint-committee of Academic Affairs and student affairs professionals established to look at NAU first-year students’ success. NSSE data, accompanied by data from Your First College Year (YFCY) and the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) are used to gauge students’ progress. The taskforce examines the first-year experience and also reviews program evaluations and outcomes-based assessments. NAU Residence Life also uses NSSE data to gauge the impact of programming. NAU requested a NSSE oversample to include students living in learning communities, using the resulting data to monitor the program’s success.

Southern CT State Hosts Fall Regional NSSE Users Workshop

The Fall 2006 Users Workshop, co-hosted by Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven, is shaping up to be one of the best yet! Several exciting sessions are scheduled. One school will share how it has used three years of NSSE results from first-year students, locally developed surveys, and focus groups to plan a "Sophomore Experience" program. Another school will outline how it uses NSSE data to prepare an accreditation self-study. A third school will describe how it has incorporated NSSE-inspired survey items into its course evaluation forms. Finally, faculty and administrative staff from our host institution will be sharing research findings from their study on a cohort of rising juniors who participated in the Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement (BCSSE) and NSSE.

Time is running out to save your place in the workshop. The deadline for registration is October 13, 2006. For more details on the workshop and to register online, please visit the NSSE Institute Web site at www.nsse.iub.edu/institute/index.cfm?view=scsu2.

The 2007-2008 workshop schedule is now available. We are planning the following workshops:

Date	Co-hosts	Location
April 19-20, 2007	Wichita State U., Friends U., Newman U.	Wichita, KS
Oct. 18-19, 2007	U. Nevada – Reno	Reno, NV
Spring 2008	Pace University	New York, NY

For more information on the workshops and other services of the NSSE Institute, please visit our Web site at: www.nsse.iub.edu/institute.

NSSE Road Show

NSSE Presentations

September 2007
Sept. 18-20	Institutional Assessment of Student Learning and Development in Macedonia (Training workshop sponsored by USAID and coordinated by World Learning)	Ohrid, Macedonia
October 2006
Oct. 5-7	National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC) Annual Conference	Pittsburgh, PA
Oct. 10-11	National Association of Vice-Presidents, Academic (NATVAC) Meeting	British Columbia NATVAC
October 13	Ohio Association for Institutional Research and Planning (OH State)	Columbus, OH
Oct. 18-21	National Academic Advising Association (NACADA) National Conference	Indianapolis, IN
Oct. 19-20	Regional NSSE Users Workshop	New Haven, CT
Oct. 23-25, 2006	Ohio College Access Network (OCAN) Conference	Columbus, OH
Oct. 28-31, 2006	National Orientation Directors Association (NODA) 2006 Conference	Salt Lake City, UT
Oct. 29-31, 2006	IUPUI National Assessment Institute	Indianapolis, IN
November 2006
Nov. 1-3, 2006	National Postsecondary Education Cooperative (NPEC) Symposium	Washington, DC
Nov. 2-4, 2006	Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE) Annual Conference	Anaheim, CA
January 2007
Jan. 17-20, 2007	Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) Annual Meeting	New Orleans, LA
FSSE Presentations
October 2006
Oct. 18-21	National Academic Advising Association (NACAC) Johnson, S. D., & Schwarz, M. J. Faculty Perceptions of Student Engagement: A Comparative Examination across Advising Models.	Indianapolis, IN
Oct. 25-29	Annual Conference of the Professional and Organizational Development Network (POD) Buckley, J. Exploring the Relationships between Reflecting on Pedagogy and Faculty Development. Nelson Laird, T. F., Buckley, J., & Palmer, M. Using What Faculty Say about Improving Their Teaching.	Portland, OR
Oct. 29-31	IUPUI National Assessment Institute Nelson Laird, T. F., Johnson, S. D., Schwarz, M. J., & Niskode, A.S. Getting Faculty Involved in the Student Engagement Conversation: The Faculty Survey of Student Engagement.	Indianapolis, IN
Nov. 2-4, 2006	Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE) Annual Conference Kuykendall, J. A., Johnson, S. D., Nelson Laird, T. F., Niskode, A. S., Ingram, T. Finding Time: An Examination of How Much Time Faculty of Color Spend on Work and Other Activities by Rank. Nelson Laird, T. F., Niskode, A. S., & Kuh, G. D. General Education Courses and the Promotion of Essential Learning Outcomes.	Anaheim, CA
BCSSE Presentations
October 2006
Oct. 6	NACAC Conference College Knowledge: From Information to Expectation	Pittsburgh, PA
Oct. 20	NACADA Conference Advising Students Toward a Greater Appreciation for Diversity	Indianapolis, IN
Oct. 30	NODAC Conference Shaping Student Expectations: Does College Orientation Matter?	Salt Lake City, UT

Conference Highlights

• Robert Gonyea co-presented with Nathan Marti from CCSSE on “CCSSE & NSSE: Using Student Engagement Data for Institutional Improvement” at the Conference of the Tennessee Association for Institutional Research, August 2006.
• At the June 2006 NASPA International Assessment and Retention conference in Phoenix, AZ, Daniel Chen presented “Nonresponse Effect in Large Scale Student Assessment.”
• Jillian Kinzie and Susan Johnson facilitated workshops and individual consultation sessions with institutions at the BEAMS/Institute for Higher Education Policy Summer Academy held in July 2006 in Puerto Rico. George Kuh delivered the plenary address, “Data Informed Decision Making.”
• Jillian Kinzie participated on a plenary panel on “Evidence & Accountability” at the Academic Affairs Summer Meeting, AASCU, July 2006.
• Some of George Kuh’s recent and upcoming presentations include:
• “Mastering and Managing the Art of Engagement: The NSSE Story,” invited address to the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges Council of Student Affairs Meeting, July 2006.
• “Student Success in College,” plenary address to the Noel-Levitz National Conference on Student Recruitment, July 2006.
• Opening Keynote Panel. Invited presentation to the Assessment Institute, October 2006.
• “What is Student Success and How Do We Know It?” invited plenary panel presentation to the National Symposium on Student Success, November 2006.
• “What Matters to Student Success in College,” keynote address to the MELMAC Student Success in Postsecondary Education Conference, November 2006.
• “Using Evidence to Document Liberal Education Outcomes and Promote Institutional Change,” and “Connecting the Dots: The Relationship between Student Engagement Results and the Institutional Practices and Conditions that Foster Success,” to be presented at the annual meeting of Association of American Colleges and Universities, January 2007.