Catherine O’Callaghan | Contributing Writer
A newly launched national survey of third level students will use student feedback to help Irish third-level institutions enhance the quality of education they provide. This is the first system-wide survey of its kind in Europe and it will be rolled out by participating institutions in February / March 2014.
In order to enhance quality and standards in Higher Education, it is vitally important that the voice of the student is listened to and harnessed effectively.”
ADVERTISEMENT
The Irish Survey of Student Engagement (ISSE) is designed to reach out to students and to hear about their full experience of higher education. Student feedback will provide institutions with valuable information that they can use to identify effective practice and provision and to prompt awareness of, and action on, any particular issues or challenges that affect students. The system is very similar to School Status in the United States. It allows parents to access a portal about their child. This would hold their grades, teacher feedback and homework notes.
A pilot survey was offered in 2013 to all first-year undergraduate, final year undergraduate and taught postgraduate students. Over 12,700 students across 26 higher education institutions participated, helping to make the survey representative of the overall student voice. In 2014, 30 institutions will participate in the survey including all universities, Institutes of Technology and Colleges of Education.
Dean of Students for Trinity College Dublin, Prof Amanda Piesse, has been heavily involved in developing this new national student survey. She said that “the Irish Survey of Student Engagement provides a rich source of data concerning student’s experience of higher education. The national scale of the survey is significant and has a real impact on the strength of students’ voices that are central to it.”
Piesse also pointed out how vital student feedback is for Higher Education Institutes and considers the survey to be “an invaluable resource in the ongoing process of improving and enhancing the student experience’s.
Joe O#Connor, President of the Union of Students in Ireland (USI), has said: In order to enhance quality and standards in Higher Education, it is vitally important that the voice of the student is listened to and harnessed effectively. This survey, through this national partnership, allows us to gauge student feedback in a way we had previously been unable to. I would call on all students to ensure they have their say, and for Higher Education Institutions to take this input seriously in implementing initiatives following on from analysis of the data produced.”
