Senior Exit Survey Research Articles

Charting the course for student success: harnessing the potential of an accreditation-focused hospitality student-exit survey

PurposeThe purpose of this research is two-fold: first, the researchers will create a reliable and valid hospitality senior exit survey by conducting a Delphi panel of experts and second, the researchers will pilot-test the instrument with students from a four-year university. The data will be (a) assessed to determine the retention of knowledge by four-year students, (b) used by academicians to make changes to course material and (c) used to help with the accreditation assessment process.Design/methodology/approachA Delphi panel of hospitality educators was used to validate the items, and graduating hospitality students were used to calculate reliability.FindingsBy embracing the hospitality exit survey (HES), institutions can effectively evaluate and enhance their programs. With its ability to gauge students' knowledge retention, the study findings serve as a powerful tool for shaping the future of hospitality education.Research limitations/implicationsThe study's findings might be somewhat limited in representing a broader range of perspectives within hospitality programs. Another limitation stems from the structure of the survey itself. The survey included numerous items requiring two inputs for each item. This format has the potential to introduce certain biases among participants.Practical implicationsIn a positive statement, organizations can use this information to discover why employees stay and then continue to develop goals/strategies to ensure this process stays up to date. Academia is no different. Academia also wants to produce the best product, and since the students are to become the next set of leaders, these programs need to know what is successful and what needs to be adjusted.Social implicationsA strategic exit interview program should 1)Uncover issues relating to human resources/students; 2) understand employees'/students' perception of the work; 3) managers'/directors' leadership style and effectiveness; 4) human resource/college/departments benchmarks and 5) improve the organization.Originality/valueThis research holds significant importance as it focuses on developing the senior HES and its potential utilization within hospitality programs. The HES serves as a valuable tool for these programs to evaluate the knowledge levels of their graduating students and collect data necessary for assessment and accreditation purposes.

An Exploratory Study of the Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic Disruptions on Veterinary Medical Education.

The COVID-19 outbreak forced educators worldwide to transition to remote teaching, which caught most of the instructors and students off-guard. Instructors had to quickly adapt and find effective substitute teaching methods during this unprecedented period, while students had to maintain motivation and engagement in the learning process. As with all educational levels and disciplines, teaching and assessment in veterinary medicine were forced to change during this adjustment period. The biggest concern regarding educational experiences was potential learning loss caused by the disruption. This study examined whether COVID-19 pandemic disruptions negatively impacted veterinary students' knowledge and skill acquisition in both basic science education, and clinical science education employing a quasi-experimental approach. Data sources included the results from standardized exams including Veterinary Educational Assessment (VEA®), the North American Veterinary Licensing Examination (NAVLE®), Objective Structured Clinical Examinations (OSCEs), and surveys (i.e., Senior Exit Survey, Alumni Survey, and the Employer Survey). Analysis of variance was computed to compare pre-COVID results with those attained during and after pandemic restrictions. The results indicated no statistically significant difference in student performance on standardized exams, but a significant drop in the mean scores for OSCEs. Students whose education was disrupted by COVID-19 pandemic restrictions were as much satisfied with the education they received as their peers whose education was not disrupted. Conclusions are discussed and recommendations for further research are provided.

Why Ethnic Studies

While the United States wrestles with a college completion crisis, the Division of Institutional Research at San Francisco State University found a high correlation between Ethnic Studies curriculum and increased student retention and graduation rates. Majors and minors in the College of Ethnic Studies graduated within six years at rates up to 92%. Those who were neither majors nor minors in Ethnic Studies also boosted their graduation rates by up to 72% by taking just a few courses in Africana Studies, American Indian Studies, Asian American Studies, Latina/Latino Studies, or Race and Resistance Studies. Faculty in the College of Ethnic Studies demonstrated significant levels of high impact instruction in the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) and senior exit surveys as compared with their colleagues across the university.

Institutionalizing Continuous Improvement Plan for Program Assessment

Continuous improvement is a corner stone of a quality engineering or engineering technology program. Accreditation Board of Engineering and Technology requires that a well-planned and implemented continuous improvement plan should be in place.A successful continuous improvement plan that is institutionalized is self-driven and does not require external stimuli. For example, if an outcome assessment goal is not reached in an academic term, a sequence of events/actions are set in motion to address the deficiency. Evidence of existence of an institutionalized continuous improvement plan include but not limited to: A timeline of repeated activities related to the assessment and evaluation of student outcomes, agreed upon performance indicators to assess learning outcomes, systematic data collection focusing on direct evidence of student performance related to the student outcomes. Various data streams feeding into the assessment plan may include, course assessment data, senior exit survey, alumni and employer survey, internship reports and feedback from industrial advisory boards.

Development and implementation of a classroom‐based Authentic Research Experience, Physiological Models for Human Disease.

The National Academies and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) have acknowledged that undergraduate education could be improved by more opportunities in authentic research (1, 2). In addition, there appears to be strong correlations between research‐based laboratories fostering an increased interest in STEM disciplines and improved grades, over traditional “cookbook” laboratories. This is especially true for underrepresented minorities and given our changing demographics at Quinnipiac, designing courses that better engage and support the student body is an essential component to our mission (3). Authentic research experiences are being implemented at many colleges and universities, as a means of giving students hands on experience conducting real science. Since there are limited research opportunities for our students to conduct faculty‐mentored research, developing a course where students can have an authentic research experience can address these shortages and obstacles (4). Additionally, in a senior exit survey completed by students within the College of Arts and Science, they expressed an interest in having more authentic lab experiences, more independent research opportunities and they wished they participated in these opportunities earlier in their career. To address some aspects of these shortages an authentic research course was developed to give students the opportunity to design and carry out experiments using one of four model organisms. Drosophila melanogaster (Fruit Fly), Caenorhabditis elgans (Roundworm), Dugesia tigrina (Planaria), or Danio rerio (Zebrafish), were all selected as model organisms because of their adaptability to undergraduate research and breadth of research topics. Student groups designed a novel experiment and generated a hypothesis, based on the current literature. The students were responsible for the animal husbandry of the models; C. elegans, D. tigrina and D. melanogaster throughout the course and performed experiments for over 50% of the semester. Once the experimental design and materials list were submitted students conducted experiments in weeks 4–6 and then analyzed their data. Following this data analysis, student groups either: repeated the same experiment, refined their experiment or generated a new question and then performed experimentation in weeks 8–11. Repeating experiments is a necessary component of scientific research, one that is typically lost in a traditional cookie‐cutter laboratory design. Students spent the remaining weeks of the semester working in their groups, analyzing data and preparing their oral presentation. The course has ran twice (Fall 2015 and Fall 2017) since it was developed and student survey response reports general satisfaction with the course.This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2018 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal.

Applied Statistical Models of Assessment and Evaluation of Instructional Efficiency

The purpose of the contemporary research was the determination of the validity and reliability of the graduating senior exit survey (GSS) as a possible supplementary instrument, to assess faculty on teaching effectiveness at a university in the southeastern US. The research approach was quantitative, and the dataset was the 426 students’ responses on specific elements of teaching effectiveness for the fall 2016 semester GSS survey at the university. Applying the Cronbach’s alpha statistic, the findings revealed the alpha for the 9 elements on the rating scale, which together assessed teaching effectiveness at the university, was .95, an indication the elements established a scale that had practical internal stability reliability for the GSS instrument. In addition, applying the principal axis factoring with varimax rotation, indicated the three indexes of teaching effectiveness, including motivation, competence, and expertise had strong positive loadings of > .40, and interconnected significantly with teaching effectiveness, thus endorsing the construct validity of the GSS instrument in assessing teaching efficacy. However, the research was limited to one semester analysis of the GSS instrument, which may be inadequate to establish the generalizability of the instrument as a measurement of teaching efficiency. Subsequent studies must include additional semesters to determine generalizability.

The value of a redesigned program and capstone course in economics

This paper describes an undergraduate program in economics which redesigned its curriculum to include a required capstone research course. The outcomes of this program are noteworthy for several reasons. To assess the impact of the high-stakes capstone research course and the redesigned program, the authors provide evidence of labor market outcomes of its graduates. Further, student learning and program outcomes are measured using direct, objective, and indirect measures, among them the ETS MFT Economics scores, awards and recognitions in undergraduate research competitions, and Senior Exit Surveys. The overall evidence suggests the redesigned economics program improved research quality among its best students, and raised median hourly wages of its graduates within two to four years of graduation.

Theory and commercial software finding the balance in finite element instruction at the undergraduate level

Like most accredited mechanical engineering programs, the undergraduate curriculum at California State University Chico includes a required course in Finite Element Analysis (FEA). Historically, the primary focus of the class has been the underlying theory of the method and its formulation from fundamental governing equations with little to no instruction in commercial software designed specifically for the purpose. Students were taught the traditional theoretical methods (Stiffness, Galerkin, Virtual Work, Castigliano, etc.) and were given assignment problems with rigorous hand-work such as assembling stiffness matrices. They were taught computer based solution methods through non-specific computational software such as Excel and MATLAB®. Feedback from advisory boards, capstone project sponsors, senior exit surveys, and other evidence clearly indicated a problem with the curriculum’s approach to finite element analysis. While program graduates were well versed in the theory of the method, there was strong evidence that they were not skilled its proper application via commercial FEA software, a very common task in the workplace. Observations included poorly posed problems, unnecessary computational rigor, meaningless results, or indeed the inability to obtain a solution at all. In response, the FEA course was redesigned to include basic instruction in the proper use of commercial FEA software while still maintaining sufficient theory for understanding the inherent assumptions and limitations of the method. Segments of theory-based discussion and traditional assignments are now followed with exploration of the same concepts in the context of commercial software. Emphasis is placed on its proper use, underlying assumptions, limitations, and validity of results.

Assessment of the Undergraduate Economics Major: A National Survey

Economics departments are faced with growing demands to document what their graduates have learned on completion of the undergraduate major. The results of a national survey of economics department chairs in the United States reveal that nearly two-thirds of the departments have a formal assessment plan. There is substantial agreement on the most important student-learning outcomes, which are consistent with the Hansen proficiencies. The most common approaches that departments employ to measure learning outcomes are course-embedded assessments and senior exit surveys. Capstone courses and senior projects as program assessment methods are most common in departments that are not in business schools and are without doctoral programs. Finally, more than half of the departments have adjusted their curriculum based on the results of their own assessment plans.

Assessment of the Undergraduate Economics Major: A National Survey

Economics departments are faced with growing demands to document what their graduates have learned upon completion of the undergraduate major. The results of a national survey of economics department chairs in the U.S. reveal that nearly two-thirds of the departments have a formal assessment plan. There is substantial agreement on the most important student learning outcomes which are consistent with the Hansen proficiencies. The most common approaches departments employ to measure learning outcomes are course embedded assessments and senior exit surveys. Undergraduate research appears to be most common in departments not in business schools and without doctoral programs. Finally, over half of the departments have made adjustments to their curriculum based on the results of their own assessment plan.

A Senior Exit Survey and its Implications for Advising and Related Services

The Department of Psychology at James Madison University conducted an assessment of undergraduate courses and instruction-related services. A 148–item questionnaire was administered to 196 graduating seniors majoring in psychology. Students assessed advising services, career services, departmental communications, research and field experiences, personal growth, and departmental courses. Questionnaire responses were based on a 4–point scale, and space was provided for written comments following each of the areas. The open-ended portions allowed students to clarify their responses and offer suggestions for improvement. Our goal was to assess and improve departmental services.

Using Senior Exit Surveys and Alumni Surveys to Assess the Quality of an Undergraduate Psychology Degree Program

Using Senior Exit Surveys and Alumni Surveys to Assess the Quality of an Undergraduate Psychology Degree Program