From Promise to Progress: How Colleges and Universities Are Using Student Engagement Results to Improve Collegiate Quality—2002 Annual Report

Abstract

The 2002 report from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) is based on information from first-year and senior students at 618 different four-year colleges and universities. The NSSE study, titled “From Promise to Progress: How Colleges and Universities Are Using Student Engagement Results to Improve Collegiate Quality,” gives schools an idea of how well students are learning and what they put into and get out of their undergraduate experience. The report focuses on how schools can use engagement data to improve their campuses. The report also contains the following findings: ■ Students from different racial and ethnic backgrounds appear to engage in effective educational practices at comparable levels. ■ International students are generally more engaged in various college experiences than American students, particularly in the first year. ■ Senior transfer students interact less with peers and faculty members and are less involved in campus activities and programs, but perform academically on par with nontransfer students. ■ Diversity-related experiences are positively related to many other effective educational practices. ■ Learning communities are positively linked to a variety of other educationally purposeful activities and desired outcomes. ■ Engagement and grades go hand-in-hand in that GPA is positively related to all five benchmark scores and nearly all of the effective educational practices represented on the NSSE survey.