Student Experience Research Advisory

Abstract

This research project is part of the SERA Initiative at the Sauder School of Business. The scope of the project focuses on undergraduate Sauder students and their views on the level of academic support provided by the school. The SERA Team suggests that a mixed methods approach combining focus groups and surveys is the most effective approach to achieve the research objectives of this project.

I. Background:

In 2009, a survey regarding overall student experience and satisfaction was conducted by the Sauder School of Business. With 400 Sauder students from all years participating, the survey generated student opinions on matters ranging from internal processes to social satisfaction and measured it against a NSSE Benchmark. Among this, one particularly result stood out. When asked whether students were satisfied with the level of support to succeed academically, a total of 41.7% said they perceived very little or some support. This, compared to a benchmark of 27.6% for percentage of students with lowest perception, exceeded the number by 14.1%.

II. Research Objectives

1. Identify the problem areas in Sauder academics where students feel they lack support

Given the broadness of the term, Academic support has been broken down into the following subtopics:

1. UGO Academic Advising
   1. Availability of academic advisors
   2. Usefulness of academic advising
   3. Further reasons for dissatisfaction
   4. Course Registration
      1. Availability of courses
      2. Course information (i.e. Professors, pre-requisites, etc)
      3. Professor Support
         1. Course scheduling and outline
         2. Professor Availability
         3. Profession Teaching Practices
         4. TA support
            1. Office Hours Support
            2. Quality of TA’s
            3. Lectures/ In Class teaching
               1. Class Size
               2. Class materials/handouts
               3. Relevance and helpfulness
               4. Assignments
                  1. Level of Difficulty
                  2. Relevance to curriculum
                  3. Feedback on Completed Assignments
                  4. Midterm/Final Exams
                     1. Level of Difficulty
                     2. Exam preparation support
                     3. Feedback on Completed exams

III. Method

1. 1. Research Design

As the background states, the research will be focused on all students within the BCom program. Through the use of Sauder aids, SERA researchers will send out focus group invitation emails. Given the objectives of the study, it is necessary before implementing any research method to gather appropriate data to screen the study participants. As the project is focused on understanding the reasons behind the low KPI indicator of student’s perception of academic support services, researchers will target students who have selected “very little” or “some” for the question involving emphasis of Sauder on academic support.

To achieve our research objectives, we have decided to utilize a mixed methods approach. Focus groups are believed to be the most appropriate research tool in this study as it provides qualitative data and group synergy. In addition, it allows for an unguided structure versus a predetermined flow of face-to-face interviews and surveys and more importantly is an effective combination of money and time invested. As our research involves gaining a deeper understanding of the problem areas in academic support, student experience researchers will use a short questionnaire to identify the population of students dissatisfied with academic services participating in the focus group.

1. 2. Survey (Up to ten questions)

The Survey method was chosen in this study as a feasible tool to target the appropriate student population. The survey will be extremely concise and primarily used to identify a student’s satisfaction with academic support. From there, researchers can have a better understanding of how to evaluate discussion comments in light of their perception – whether it is highly dissatisfied or highly satisfied. In addition, the survey will address the following research needs: 1) establish students’ definition of support services, 2) weigh different academic support services according to students needs (second page of the survey), 3) identify any other quantitative data (such as gender, international versus domestic student, year, 4) conduct details to participate in focus groups.

1. 3. Focus Groups

Focus groups were chosen as the most effective research method to achieve our research objectives. Not only will focus groups gather necessary qualitative data, but also generate ideas on how to improve academic support at Sauder. It is one of the few research tools that allow for a synergetic group effect: brainstorming and group generated data. It is thus important for researchers in their further data analysis to note that all data generated in focus group discussions is socially constructed and subject to group think. Providing pre- and after-session questionnaires may assist researchers in noting the level of group think.

As surveys will be used prior, the focus groups will follow a semi-structured flow. Surveys will generate all the structured data necessary, while the focus group itself will have more open-ended and group-discussion questions. Given the wide range of topics under academic support, we have decided to conduct focus groups with 7-12 participants in each group.

Each year of Sauder students have specific academic needs they signaled: for example, 2^nd and 3^rd years were most dissatisfied with course registration compared to other years. Forming focus groups for each year will provide more time on discussing the most problematic areas of academic support for each year, and allow for more focused data collection and livelier discussions as students may be more comfortable to discuss academic needs with students in the same year.

Procedures:

The focus groups will follow the approach of semi-structured interviews. Given that three student researchers will be involved in the project, two of them will serve as moderators while the other serves as a research assistant. Researcher’s roles may alternate for different focus groups.

Pre-focus group tasks:

1-    Send out focus group opportunity email

2-    Select students randomly (if the number of responses exceed 12 per year) for each focus group based on their year of enrolment

3-    Send Pre-focus groups questionnaires

4-    Prepare moderator’s guide that will cover focus-group scripts for specific tasks outlined below

Focus group-specific guidelines of moderator(s):

1-    Introduction and introductory activities:

The main goal of this step is to establish rapport with subjects, make them comfortable, and explain subjects the goals of the study. Activities should:

• Explain confidentiality of the study conducted
• Briefly describe project and ensure that participants understand their role
• Conduct introductory activity (such as introductions of each student) so that subjects feel more comfortable
• State basic rules and guidelines:

2-    Ask a short series of questions to stimulate short series of discussions in which researchers:

• Determine students’ definition of support needed to succeed academically
• Gather data about students’ perception of each service (or subtopic) provided from the research objectives
• Weight the importance of each service (or subtopic) to each student
• Open the floor to recommendations for each problem area identified

3-    Conclude discussions by thanking everybody and distributing gift cards

Focus group-specific guidelines to research assistant:

1-    Hand out confidentiality agreement

2-    Take field notes about group dynamics

3-    Assist in identifying voices when it comes time to transcribe the recording of the focus group

All discussions that will occur during the focus group will be recorded and transcribed as described in the data collection tools section of this report.

IV. Data collection Tools

For this project we will be using audio devices to record our focus groups. We feel that the best way to record all the data for these focus groups will be done through audio as well as notes that will be taken by one of the SERA project members. The process of using audio recording as well as note taking will ensure that we capture everything that transpires during the focus group. The audio equipment will be provided by the Sauder School of Business. We will be using boardroom HA 194 to conduct our focus groups and this room offers both video and audio recording equipment. We have decided not to use video recording because we believe that it may alter the responses we receive from the student. Judging from our previous projects, students are generally very comfortable with just audio recording.

During the focus group, one member of SERA will be given the responsibility to take notes. These notes will include student responses, body language, tones, and any other subtle nuances expressed by the students. The aim for this process is to make the respondents feel as comfortable as possible so that we can extract the best quality information. Each focus group will be run by at least two SERA members.