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Early Semester Surveys

One way to connect individually with your students is to ask them to fill out a simple survey in the first few weeks of the semester.

There are no right or wrong questions to ask in a questionnaire. When choosing what to include, consider what you will do with the information. Exclude any questions that you don’t anticipate acting upon.

Addy et al. (2021) describe a “Who’s in Class” survey in Chapter 6 of their book. This inclusive teaching methodology uses a series of binary (yes/no) questions followed by demographic information and 3 short-answer questions that allow students to express how their identities and experiences may impact their learning and expectations in the course.

Schmitt et al. (2013) recommend including questions focused on student expectations in five categories: technology, learning activities, learning assessments, faculty-student interactions, and timeliness of action.

A basic student questionnaire can be modified to serve your needs. Choose the format that works best for you: [printable Word version] [Microsoft Forms electronic version]

You may be interested in the “Who’s in Class” survey by Addy et al. (2021) described above. Navigate to Chapter 6 of the book What Inclusive Instructors Do: Principles and Practice for Excellence in College Teaching to access the questions.

The expectation questions that Schmitt et al. (2013) recommend, may be found in Table 1 of their article.

You may also find an Interactive Syllabus, which is more in-depth than a questionnaire, serves your needs best.

Electronic surveys have certain advantages. They are essential for online courses. And even for in-person classes, they will aggregate results, which can be helpful for gaining a whole-class perspective on certain questions (such as what percentage of students are working 20 hours or more per week).

Surveys can be built right into Canvas (using the Quiz tool –> Ungraded Survey option). Additionally, surveys can easily be customized using Microsoft Forms, part of the Microsoft 365 suite to which the VSCS subscribes. Contact the Learning Technologies team via a HelpDesk ticket for assistance using these tools.

Addy, T. M., Dube, D., Mitchell, K. A., & SoRelle M. (2021). What inclusive instructors do : Principles and practices for excellence in college teaching. Routledge.

Schmitt, K. R. B., Larsen, E.A., Miller, M., Badawy, A.A., Dougherty, M., Sharma, A.T., Hrapczynski, K., Andrew, A., Robertson, B., Williams, A., Kramer, S., & Benson, S. (2013). A survey tool for assessing student expectations early in a semester. Journal of Microbiology & Biology Education (24), 2, 255-257. https://doi.org/10.1128/jmbe.v14i2.581