Undergraduate students
2008 National Student Survey (NSS) and Student Satisfaction
Survey (SSS) Results
Summary Report
The NSS responses are from final year students only, whereas SSS results are Years One and Two students with the exception of Year 2 Community Theatre, Stage Combat and Technical Theatre students who are classed as final year students by the surveys as they are completing the second year of a 2-year Foundation Degree. 90% of East 15 students completed the SSS survey.
Teaching on my course: East 15 scores for both SSS and NSS reveal continuing high levels of satisfaction with final year NSS students returning 94%, 96% and 99% positive feedback on how good staff are at explaining things, how interesting they made the subject and their enthusiasm. NSS score for ‘the course is intellectually stimulating’ rose from 66% in 2007 to 75% agreement in the 2008 survey. The SSS returned slightly lower levels but still well above the University average. For example, 91% of respondents returned positive feedback on the enthusiasm of East 15 teaching staff.
Action: The School will continue to seek to attract and retain an international staff of tutors and practitioners who are at the forefront of the industry.
Assessment and Feedback: Assessment criteria, assessment arrangements and marking have emerged as the areas in which students expressed some dissatisfaction with only 46% of NSS students positive with regard to clarity of marking criteria and 49% positive with regard to the fairness of assessment arrangements. SSS students overall expressed higher levels of confidence than NSS students. Scores on feedback give an inconsistent picture for eg. 78% of NSS students reported receiving detailed comments on their work but only 57% considered that feedback was promptly given and only 65% considered feedback to have helped to clarify things not understood. Oral feedback is a continuous and integral part of the day-to-day interaction between tutors and students engaged in practice-based training, as well as being delivered in the form of rehearsal and performance ‘notes’ by directors. It is possible, however, that students do not fully appreciate the different forms of oral feedback they receive, or are unaware when they are receiving feedback.
Action: Teaching staff have been asked to ensure that students receive a high level of feedback and to draw students’ attention to occasions when they are receiving feedback, both oral and written.
It should be noted that two of the School’s ordinary degrees, BA Acting and BA Contemporary Theatre Practice were revalidated in 2007-2008 as Honours degrees and uncertainty with regard to the effect of this change at the time the surveys were conducted may have influenced students’ low scoring with regard to clarity of marking criteria and fairness of assessment arrangements. Assessments and marking criteria were published in all the Course Books for the first time in 2007-2008 but this information has obviously taken some time to be absorbed into students’ perception of assessments. It is clearly necessary to take a pro-active approach to briefing students on assessments and marking criteria, which will be undertaken during the second term.
Action: Academic Manager will give individual student year groups specific briefings on rules of assessment and marking criteria in Term 2 2009.
Academic Support: Students appear generally satisfied with the level of academic support received in both SSS and NSS surveys, with scores in line with the University average score overall (72%). NSS students were slightly less convinced that they had received sufficient and advice and support for their studies (67%) than SSS students (72%). 87% of final year students felt they were able to contact staff when they needed to, as opposed to 71% of first and second year students.
In discussion of this item as part of the School’s Annual Monitoring Report (AMR), student representatives suggested these results may reflect short-term concerns rather than giving an overall reflection of their student experience as a whole. The student representatives suggested it would be helpful for students to be briefed on the structure and purpose of the surveys and encouraged to give an overall assessment of their student experience rather than concentrating on short term issues in their responses, although it would be emphasised that students are totally free to respond as they wished to the surveys.
Action: Student support administrators will give a short briefing to student year groups in Term 2. Heads of Courses/Skills have been asked to ensure that all teaching staff provide high levels of support to students under the headings listed in the survey.
Organisation and Management: East 15 scores for this category have fallen. Scores for both NSS and SSS are lower than the University average in all categories under this section of the survey, with the exception of the timetable, which for SSS students at least is near the University average, with 72% satisfaction. However, the survey reveals that only 40% of final year students considered their course to be well organised and running smoothly and only 45% felt that changes in the course or teaching had been effectively communicated. SSS respondents were less dissatisfied but scores were still approximately 20% lower than the University average.
The School has been through a period of dynamic, unprecedented change and growth over a very short period of time and continues to do so at both the Loughton and Southend campuses. This has had an on-going effect on student satisfaction with the organisation and management of courses as the changes go into effect. There will continue to be changes throughout the period to 2011-2012 as the School moves towards planned growth at the Southend campus. Tighter timetabling, close staff/student liaison and better teaching space allocation and control have been introduced across both campuses to help address this issue, as students and staff adapt to new work and structures.
Action: The School is strengthening staff-student liaison via the Students Association with the intention of communicating strategic planning and developments more effectively to the student body as a whole. Digital notice boards will be installed at both Loughton and Southend campuses to facilitate the efficient and timely notification of day-to-day organisation and management changes to students.
Learning Resources: East 15 students’ satisfaction with IT resources amongst SSS students scored only 57% against a University average of 81%. There is clearly an issue with regard to the parity of IT provision across campuses that needs to be resolved centrally by the University. Satisfaction with access to specialised equipment, facilities and rooms rose by 10% but remains significantly lower than the University average of 66% satisfaction.
At a meeting of the Staff-Student Liaison Committee at which the survey results were discussed representatives of the Students Association suggested that East 15 students may have a wider interpretation of what constitutes satisfactory resources than other University students. Efforts to improve the resources available to East 15 students have concentrated on teaching spaces, IT and library facilities and it was disappointing that East 15 SSS scores for this remained stable at 15-20% lower than the University average.
The Student Association representatives suggested that first year students may have been thinking of the limited access they were given to other resources such as costumes, props and technical support when scoring for the survey. As access to these items is deliberately restricted for first year students, in order to encourage them to focus on their inner resources, first year tutors should ensure that students understood the pedagogic reasons for this approach.
Action: Pressure on teaching space will continue to be addressed by rationalising student numbers across both Southend and Loughton campuses and the acquisition of additional teaching space in the Clifftown Studios in Southend. The provision of specialist Library resources at Loughton, begun in 2008, will continue to be developed. A programme of building refurbishment to improve existing teaching space at Hatfields on the Loughton campus is in place and will continue throughout 2008-2009.
Personal Development: Scores for personal development are excellent and remain consistently at between 15% and 30% higher than the University average. NSS students recorded 90% satisfaction with improvements in their ability to present themselves with confidence. 81% of SSS students and 88% of NSS students felt confident in tackling unfamiliar problems as a result of the course. 75% of SSS students and 89% of NSS students reported improvement in their communication skills compared to 66% of students in the University overall.
Overall Satisfaction with Quality of Degree: The overall satisfaction score for SSS students is the same as that of the University as a whole (82%) which is satisfactory. Interestingly, the NSS overall satisfaction score, which was last year the lowest in the University, is now at 84%, ie 2% higher than the University average.
Leon Rubin
Director
East 15 Acting School
January 2009
