A Supportive Environment for Better Teaching Practices

Joe Strickland
May 1, 2020

Traditionally, faculty working in higher education have experienced pedagogical isolation stemming from a lack of community and collegiality in teaching. While many colleges and universities have recently shown support for teaching and learning centers, substantive institutional and environmental support for good teaching may still be considered as an institutional shortcoming. Analysts at the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE) used data from […]

Linking Creative Coursework Activities to the NSSE Engagement Indicators

Angie Miller
April 28, 2020

A recent special issue on developing creativity, Gifted and Talented International included an article authored by NSSE Research Scientist Angie Miller that dives deeper into the connections between creative coursework and student engagement for seniors. A large body of research demonstrates that creativity training can be effective in academic situations, in K-12 as well as higher education. Prior research using items from the NSSE Senior […]

STEM Faculty Teaching Practices

Kyle Fassett
April 24, 2020

In November, we presented a poster at the Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE). It sought to look at the changes in teaching practices of STEM faculty at master's institutions over the course of 10 years. The study used data from the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE) from the years 2007, 2012, and 2017 with nearly 3,800 respondents in total. […]

Understanding student use of e-textbooks

Allison BrckaLorenz
April 21, 2020

Digital devices have become part of our everyday lives, at home, at work, and at school. As an example of technology integration in education, e-textbooks are becoming more available in higher education as they offer features that are intended to enhance teaching and learning at a cost advantage. Adoption of e-textbooks in US higher education institutions have been mostly driven by student choice although […]

Top College Choices by Student Sexual Orientation

Kyle Fassett
April 17, 2020

Students belonging to marginalized sexual orientations frequently lack social and cultural capital (Baez et al., 2007; Windmeyer, 2006). This can prove to be a barrier to attend college and ultimately achieve a degree (Williams Institute, 2017). Moreover, institutions often struggle to recruit LGBQ+ students due to lack of resources or systems in place to facilitate their admissions process. With more and more […]

You Know What They Say About Those Majors: Exploring Personality Traits Across Major Fields

Angie Miller and Rosemarie Lerma
April 14, 2020

NSSE Research Scientist Angie Miller and IU doctoral student Rosemarie Lerma presented a study at the 2019 American Educational Research Association that looked at potential differences in personality traits across majors. For college students, choosing a major is an essential part of establishing an identity and achieving desired post-graduation outcomes. There are also many stereotypes prevalent in popular culture that are associated with various majors: […]

What NSSE Data Tells Us About Online Learning and Student Engagement

Angie Miller and Amber Dumford
April 10, 2020

In a recent issue of the Journal of Computing in Higher Education, NSSE Research Scientist Angie Miller and University of South Florida Associate Professor Amber Dumford authored an article looking at how online learning impacts student engagement. Both authors were interested in this topic after having taught online classes themselves. Teaching through this medium has its own sets of struggles, for both students and teachers, but it can […]

What Causes Are Students Active In?

Thomas Kirnbauer and Dajanae Palmer
April 3, 2020

At the 2018 Association for the Study of Higher (ASHE) Allison (analyst), Dajanae (student), Donté Miller (student), and Thomas Kirnbauer (student) shared research findings related to the Student Activism experimental item set. The item set was a part of the Spring 2017 NSSE administration and was designed to capture which issues and causes most concern college students; the complete set of questions can […]

BCSSE to ask Coronavirus disruption questions of high school graduates

April 2, 2020

BCSSE will ask additional questions on the web version of the survey about the impact of the pandemic on the high school experiences of first-year students who graduated in 2020. There is no additional fee for these special questions. Responses to these items will be merged with core BCSSE data for participating institutions. View the BCSSE survey and Coronavirus Item Set here. Colleges and universities interested in asking questions of their entering students […]

Kicking off NSSE’s listening tour: What’s in the future for student engagement?

Ryan Merckle
March 19, 2020

At the 2020 AAC&U annual meeting, conference goers were invited to focus on the shape and future of higher education. Coupled with NSSE's planning for its third decade, we took that cue and engaged participants in a thoughtful discussion centered on current trends and future possibilities of engagement as a lens for examining college quality. When launched in 2000, NSSE had two main objectives. […]