By Becca Robb | Echo
It may be easy to overlook mass emails from Taylor administration, but an upcoming email will link to a survey that could give students a voice in administrative decisions.
On Monday, each student will receive an email with a link to the Student Satisfaction Inventory, a biennial survey that gauges student satisfaction at Taylor. Active from Nov. 2-15, this survey gives students a small window to influence academic affairs.
Participants will see a value statement, such as, "It is an enjoyable experience to be a student on this campus." They will be asked to rate the statement in two ways: how important it is to them and how satisfied they are with it, both on a scale of 1 to 7.
In previous years, student engagement has hovered around 25 percent of the total student body, Kim Case, director of assessment and quality improvement, said. This year she hopes to engage 50 percent of students.
"This is where it gets a little tricky," Case said. "We want to make sure that every possible voice can be in the pool of responses, because that will give us a more accurate assessment of what is actually going on."
One way that the assessment team hopes to increase engagement is by offering incentives. Survey participants are entered to win one of ten $5 vouchers for the Jumping Bean or one of five $20 gift cards to the Bookstore.
The University Assessment Council, which analyzes and organizes the resulting data, can compare Taylor's results with results from other schools in the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU). They can then propose plans for improvement.
In 2011, students indicated dissatisfaction with career services. As a result, the University proposed an action project for improvement. Now the Calling and Career Office uses a Blackboard page to share resources such as sample résumés and cover letters, internship and job searches as well as possible career paths for each major.
"That's just one example of, 'We heard what you said in the survey; now we want to do something about it,'" Case said.
The campus can't expect to see changes right away, said Case. While the statements indicate areas of excellence or potential improvement, they don't ask students for specific advice.
"It might take as much as a year . . . for each of the areas that are identified to drill down deeper into (the identified issues)," Case said.
