It Takes a Committee: Improving Mizzou’s NSSE Response Rate
The committee’s NSSE Campus Tour revealed the close connection between the various groups across the university and the needs and activities of institutional research and assessment.
The University of Missouri resolved to use its NSSE results for strategic planning starting with the 2018–19 school year. To have more reliable data for planning and assessment, the university set the goal for its response rate at 30%—nearly double its previous response rate of 17%.
Mizzou’s Vice Provost for Institutional Research, and the Vice Provost Undergraduate Studies, in partnership with the Interim Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs formed a committee to focus on boosting NSSE response rates as well as increasing uses of NSSE data. The committee membership represented the Division of Student Affairs; the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; the Office of Institutional Research; the undergraduate deans; the Honors College; the Center for Academic Success and Excellence; and an assistant professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis who uses NSSE data in his research and explained in depth how NSSE data could be used by the different campus areas.
The main areas of the university’s strategic plan concerning the committee were those of students’ success and experiences. While the committee did not have a specific question in approaching NSSE data, they resolved during the year to develop a full plan for the use of NSSE data.
The NSSE Committee carried its message across the Mizzou community in a NSSE Campus Tour, meeting with advisors, undergraduate deans, social justice centers, and any other campus groups that regularly interact with students. The committee made presentations about the value of NSSE data, explaining how and why NSSE is important and how each group can use NSSE results. They also discussed methods to increase response rates of response to the survey.
These discussions revealed the close connection between the various groups across the university and the needs and activities of institutional research and assessment. This served to increase investment among the various representatives of these groups to more vigorously promote the survey to their students.
The Undergraduate Dean advocated using Canvas learning management system software this year. To advertise the survey, digital display screens across campus were used. Social media provided students easy access to Canvas. To boost the response rate still higher, students were offered attractive incentives—which had administration support because of the importance of NSSE in the strategic plan.
The incentives were a chance to win an Apple Watch Series 3, a $1,000 gift card for an Apple Product, an MU parking pass, or a $100 Mizzou Store gift card. These incentives certainly helped, but the buy-in from academic units helped even more. Fully 60% of the first-year students’ survey responses came via Canvas (the university’s learning management platform), a mode for responding that students likely considered trustworthy.
Mizzou’s campaign resulted in a final response rate of 44%—surpassing the university’s ambitious goal!
Looking ahead, the committee has noted that NSSE will be useful in continued implementation of the university’s strategic plan. The committee intends to meet again in the fall, when they will share this year’s NSSE results and develop methods to use them across campus. The work of the NSSE Committee at the University of Missouri demonstrates that campus partnerships are essential to the success of efforts to promote survey participation and to use survey results to improve undergraduate education.
