SUHEILY, do you meet with all the student representatives in one large meeting? Who leads the conversation? What are some outcomes from this forum? How are the representatives chosen?
SUHEILY, sounds like an interesting place to work and study. Can you give us some examples of ways you deal with students that are impacted because of language?
You have to ensure that students are being given realistic expectations. That starts with properly training your Admissions staff. They need to be very knowledgeable about your curriculum so that they don't give the student any incorrect impressions of your program.
Our institution assures the student expectations are being met and that they are satisfied through the surveys/evaluations and through the student support specialits. Different support specialists have various ways to assure their student expectations are being met and that they are satisfied. Well check calls and emails help the staff become aware of any issues. There are many actions that we do to try to motivate and put smiles on the students faces. For example, the Bravo Room identifies Honor Roll students, Perfect Attendance students and students that have completed their certification exams. Some specialists send happy birthday, baby congrats, wedding congrats, and get well soon emails. When A student is not attending or passing a class, there is contact made to try to solve the problem. Once resolved, a congrats email might go out for bringing grade up to a passing level or for no longer being an attendance risk. Sometimes the motivating and encouraging emails are constant for certain issues. I, personally send out emails before class the next scheduled class to prepare the students for what is ahead.
For most programs, we have a "College Success" course that introduces the student to the college atmosphere and what to expect. We address the different kinds of deterrents (situational, personal, institutional) to continuing their dream of a new career path. For instance, if they have small children at home, do they have a backup plan if the babysitter cannot come or if a child becomes ill? Transportation, illness, dissatisfaction with instructors, curriculum, or most importantly, financial aid are among the topics we discuss. They exchange phone numbers/emails with their new classmates and we try to create a sense of community during those first weeks of class. We also now have a Wonderlic test to assess the student for basic skills.
We experience many of the same problems with the surveys. Students who express their concerns do not believe the surveys are read or that their concerns are taken seriously. Many just plow through the survey giving the instructor high grades, but because they have an issue with financial aid, they indicate they would not recommend the school.
Our institution does several different things. We do student surveys at the end of every course, which is a survey of the instructor. For every group of new students, we conduct a survey 2 weeks into classes to determine if we are meeting their needs. Our Career Services department meets with each student to discuss their future career and their goals. We also conduct phone calls to students missing class to determine what the absence is related to.
We talk to the admissions reps to make sure what they are saying is a unified message we are all speaking. We have individual meetings their 1st quarter and last quarter to go over how they are progressing in the program and if they need help with anything. We also do quarterly surveys to get feedback of student satisfaction.
Our school has an open door policy. At anytime a student has questions about the curriculum, facilities or basically anything to do with their education they are able to meet with any of the department chairs and even the president if necessary to discuss their concerns.
In our institution we use different types of strategies to measure the satisfaction of estudientes.
The first is that we maintain an open door policy. From 9:00 am to 8:00 pm we have staff from integrated services deparment available to listen and address concerns of the ours students.
Second. We conduct a meeting every five weeks with a student representative for each class that is being offered in the semester. In other words one representative per room.
In this meeting both student representatives and representatives of the institution share the concerns, achievements and areas for improvement of the university.
FInally we use different assessment to gather student satisfacion in different areas. Such as end-of-course survey, evaluation of teachers, survey of enrollment process survey on the services offered at the library.
I work for Ana g Mendez University Systemthe at Tampa Bay Campus, Florida. In our case we have a particular institution because it is bilingual Englsh ans Spanish. Our retention is based on the needs for students to improve inglish and spanish. So our services and program are focused on strategies to enable students to acquire the language. We ofer the services in english and spanish, our classes are bilingual, teachers and administrative staff speak both languages ​​and students feel comfortable that we maintain an environment of acceptance.
In addition cultural diversity is one of our most important features, therefore we are always educating ourselves to understand the different needs of the different cultures that we have.
Good effort, Aprilan. I have to think that your students appreciate your effort to improve their classroom experience.
I could give a mid-term survey but it would not be anonymous and it would be a manual process.
I frequently ask for oral feedback from the students(throughout the course) and have used this method to make changes to the course material and teaching methods.
I feel this works to a certain degree, not all students feel comfortable discussing things that are dissatisfied with.
If I receive feedback that is out of my control I will bring it to the attention of my supervisor and bring it up in our staff meetings. Hopefully with a speedy resolution.
Callie, are they equally proficient in using the feedback to improve the experience/results?
Keisha, I hope you are given some guidance about how to use these surveys to improve your classroom.
Sounds like a broken system, Aprilan. I'm actually a little surprised you get any feedback with this response record.
Do you have the ability to give a mid-term survey for your own use? Do you get your department head involved in responding to student input.
doug, if the students don't react well why does the school keep doing it? Unhappy students aren't likely to provide useful data. Isn't there another way to get the feedback that will be more useful?
At the end of each course the students are given a survey so they have the ability to express to the institution their individual satisfaction or lack of satisfaction.
My institution is wonderfully proficient in gaining student feedback via conferences, end-of-term surveys, and by encouraging students to share their suggestions with administration.
Well I'm new to my current position but from what I understand we give surveys out to the students at the end of each term. And also at the end of their schooling to allow them to give honest feed back about the program, the classes, the instructors and staff. And then the surveys get sent out to our corp. office.
