[Academic] FW: NSS results

Mon Sep 3 10:15:05 BST 2018

Dear All,

Please find attached a copy of the NSS questions, which will be needed for today’s meeting. Please can I stress that this is not a meeting to discuss whether the changes in student responses are statistically significant, but what we can do to improve where appropriate.

Nigel

On 3 Sep 2018, at 09:18, Catherine Cheshire <cath.cheshire at strath.ac.uk<mailto:cath.cheshire at strath.ac.uk>> wrote:

Dear All

Following on from the emails circulated by Paul, this is just a reminder of the Extraordinary Meeting of the DC taking place today from 12.00 - 1 pm in JA 5.06.

Catherine.

-----Original Message-----
From: Paul McKenna <paul.mckenna at strath.ac.uk<mailto:paul.mckenna at strath.ac.uk>>
Sent: 24 August 2018 15:33
To: academic at phys.strath.ac.uk<mailto:academic at phys.strath.ac.uk>
Cc: Gabrielle Weir <gabrielle.weir at strath.ac.uk<mailto:gabrielle.weir at strath.ac.uk>>; Catherine Cheshire <cath.cheshire at strath.ac.uk<mailto:cath.cheshire at strath.ac.uk>>; Audrey McKinnon <audrey.mckinnon at strath.ac.uk<mailto:audrey.mckinnon at strath.ac.uk>>
Subject: Re: NSS results

Colleagues,

Following on from my email earlier this week with the NSS results and a review meeting at Faculty level this morning, this email contains a summary of actions for all academic staff. I can also confirm that the extraordinary meeting of the DC to discuss these will be held on Monday 3rd September, from 12.00 to 1.00pm, in JA5.06.

Firstly, thank you for your much hard and valued work relating to our Department’s performance in the NSS. This is recognised and appreciated, and areas where we have done well or improved have been noted. However, some of our scores this year highlight that we need to put in additional effort to achieve improvement in several areas, and we are developing an action plan to help achieve this. The plan will include:
•    Consulting with last year’s final year students (many of whom are
now PhD students in the Department) and discussing their feedback with this year’s students to identify ongoing issues that need to be addressed. This is specifically aimed at addressing our performance in
Q5 and Q6 in the Learning Opportunities category of questions.
•    Providing detailed project feedback, using a pro-forma to ensure
consistency in approach, and making marking schemes for continuous assessment available to students at the time of issuing task. These actions will help to address dips in response to Q8 and Q9 in the Assessment and Feedback category of questions.
•    Setting elements of continuous assessment as group work,
particularly in Final Year classes, to address Q22 under the Learning Community category.

The overall NSS results for the Faculty and University have generated much concern at senior levels and as a result, in addition to the department-specific action plan, all departments are asked to:
•    Introduce individual interviews for every final year student,
preceded by the students completing a short questionnaire to inform the discussion. The purpose is to strengthen communication with the students, manage their expectations, allow guidance on their aspirations and facilitate diffusion of tension on specific issues.
•    Ask each individual member of academic and teaching staff to
include a work objective relating to NSS improvement in their planning for the year ahead.  Staff are asked to propose a NSS improvement objective, along with the measurement of success for that objective, and to email that to their ADR reviewer for approval. The ADR Reviewers should confirm to their HoD by no later than 14th September that an NSS improvement related objective has been set for each member of academic and teaching staff for whom they have responsibility as a Reviewer.

The Faculty also plans to work with departments on new social and staff/student events to strengthen our learning communities and to enhance the role of the Faculty Learning Enhancement Committee (FLEC) in improving areas highlighted by NSS.

Nigel and Gabrielle will provide more details on the action plan for the Department in due course. This will include plans for the student interviews and guidance around setting NSS improvement related ADR objectives and measurements.  We will also send a proforma to the relevant ADR reviewers to compile and record these, for submission ahead of the 14th September University deadline.

We will discuss all of this at the DC on 3rd September. The acting-Dean will also attend the meeting.

Thank you for your continued work in this important area.

Regards,
Paul

On 21/08/2018 12:59, Paul McKenna wrote:
Dear Colleagues,

Please see the attached file with a summary of our NSS results.

We have a good number of highest quartile scores and only three in the
lowest quartile. Whilst our overall student satisfaction has stayed
approximately constant, there are several areas in which we have
dropped in performance since last year. We have maintained our
position within the Faculty and University rankings, but dropped with
respect to other Physics departments (from 2nd to 4th in Scotland and
from 8th to 14th in the UK). There are a couple of negative comments
made on isolated issues (which we will address), but also many
positive comments, and in particular relating to the enthusiasm and
support of staff in the Department.

Nigel and I have an NSS review meeting with the Faculty this Friday to
discuss ways to improve our performance and we will be in touch again
after that to communicate a plan of action going forward.

We also intend to hold an extraordinary meeting of the Departmental
Committee to discuss the plans, ahead of the start of the semester.
This is provisionally scheduled for Monday 3rd September, from 12.00
to 1.00pm. Please hold this date and time for now, and this will be
confirmed in due course. Thanks.

Regards,

Paul

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