PBA Home > Institutional Research & Analysis > Surveys > NSSE 2002 > Introduction

National Surveys of Student Engagement 2000 and 2002

Introduction

In 2000 and 2002, the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU-Boulder) participated in national administrations of the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE). This survey is supported by Lumina Foundation for Education and The Pew Charitable Trusts, and is co-sponsored by The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and The Pew Forum on Undergraduate Learning. It is administered by a team at Indiana University. The NSSE gathers information about experiences and skills that students acquire during college and their academic and non-academic activities. It is designed to provide data that colleges and universities can use to improve undergraduate education, and it is administered in both web and paper formats with identical questions. Participating institutions may choose web-only, paper-only, or web- plus-paper formats. CU-Boulder chose to use web-only, both in 2000 and 2002. CU-Boulder participated in the Association of American Universities Data Exchange consortium, which administered 20 optional questions to students as part of NSSE.

Table 1 shows the numbers of CU-Boulder freshmen and seniors who responded to the survey, by year:

The overall response rate in 2000 was 40%. In 2002, it was somewhat lower (34%). The decrease in response rates reflects a general trend observed in surveys at CU-Boulder and elsewhere. Moreover, it is possible that 2002 NSSE response rates were adversely affected by circumstances of the administration process. During the 2002 administration, CU-Boulder's spring break occurred between two important events: the invitation to participate in NSSE and the receipt of the survey instrument. It is possible that some students were less motivated to participate in the survey after returning from spring break. For additional information about how students were selected to participate, please see Method.

CU-Boulder NSSE 2002 Main Page

Last revision 02/27/06

l:\ir\survey\NSSE\02\report\results.doc