ISU students are involved in a survey that could help them improve their own learning potential.

Iowa State is one of 530 colleges and universities from the United States and Canada that is participating in the 2005 online National Survey of Student Engagement. The school is also one of 133 to register in the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement in the past two years. Both surveys are coordinated by Indiana University.

“Our goal is to get feedback from students and improve student learning,” Brooke said. “We survey faculty so much. It will be nice to see what the students have to say.”

The surveys are designed to obtain information about student participation in programs, activities and student-faculty interaction. Prospective students, advisers and researchers can use the information to discover what students gain from their experiences at various colleges and universities. The results are used to improve undergraduate education.

“Two thousand ISU freshmen and 2,000 seniors were randomly selected from each class to participate,” said Gebre Tesfagiorgis, director of institutional research. “In the past, the response rate has been 35 percent for students.”

Corly Brooke, director of the Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching, said the National Survey of Student Engagement has created five benchmarks to measure effective educational practices. These examine the level of academic challenge, active and collaborative learning, student-faculty interaction, enriching educational experience and supportive campus environment.

It is difficult to get direct measures about students and learning, so the survey helps Iowa State discover what should be done, Brooke said. The findings allow the Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching to plan workshops and focus groups for faculty.

Faculty can also use National Survey of Student Engagement results to do studies for the university.

“The provost’s office asked us to check out the link between student engagement and student achievement,” said Mack Shelley, director for the Research Institute for Studies in Education.

Shelley and his colleague, Kevin Saunders, post-doctoral research associate for the Research Institute for Studies in Education, used National Survey of Student Engagement findings to do a study on whether participating in a learning community is linked with student engagement, better education and overall satisfaction.

The National Survey of Student Engagement’s sister program, the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement, was launched in spring 2004. It measures faculty expectations for student engagement in the classroom and extracurricular activities, which are linked to higher levels of learning and development.

“All 1,395 faculty members can participate in the survey electronically,” Tesfagiorgis said.

Both surveys’ results are expected to be available by early fall, Brooke said.