National Student Survey (NSS)

What is the NSS?

The National Student Survey (NSS):-

• is a large-scale survey of students almost all universities in the UK.
• gives final year undergraduates at Glasgow the chance to tell us how they rate their academic experience.
• is conducted by Ipsos MORI (an independent market research agency).

The University of Glasgow has participated in the NSS since 2006.

What are the latest results from the NSS?

The 2012 NSS results show that 89% of our undergraduate students are satisfied with their experience, and in some subjects this rises to nearly 100%. Final year students continued to highlight particular satisfaction with: Teaching on my course and Learning Resources.

The results also identified key areas where we can do better: in particular, Assessment and Feedback, and Organisation and Management. The University has made a concerted effort to make students’ experience better in these areas and we have seen some improvement in the level of student satisfaction (see below) over the past few years.  Both areas will continue to be a priority for the University. 

You can find the latest 2012 results and compare results for different universities at: www.unistats.com

What has the University done with the results to make improvements?

We use the Survey feedback to enhance the quality of our degree programmes and your educational experience. We keep it in mind as the educational environment of the University is developed so that future students benefit from the experience of current undergraduates.

For the University, Assessment and Feedback has been the priority action arising from the NSS results since 2007. Over the years, a variety of work has been undertaken to improve what we do in this key area, and we are pleased to see that students expressed greater satisfaction with Assessment and Feedback issues in 2012, building on the year on year improvements since 2007. We now see evidence of high satisfaction in some areas, such as Celtic Studies, and some areas which are showing significant improvement, such as Medicine (20% better in 2012!).  However, Assessment and Feedback will continue to be an institutional priority and steps will also be taken to show that student feedback is valued and acted upon.  Organisation & Management issues tend to be localised will be prioritised for those subjects with lower levels of student satisfaction.

The Education Policy and Strategy Committee of Senate receives reports on actions taken by Colleges in the light of the NSS results to ensure that there is progress with actions. A range of initiatives have been taken forward by Colleges in response to NSS 2012.  You can read details of these in the Colleges' Progress reports on the NSS 2012 that were received by EdPSC in October 2012. 

The latest progress report for each College can be accessed via the links below:-

NSS 2012 Report - College of Arts (2012 report awaiting final confirmation)
NSS 2012 Report - College of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences 
NSS 2012 Report - College of Science & Engineering  
NSS 2012 Report - College of Social Sciences