1. FALL 2011-SPRING 2012
CONNECT TO LEARNING
CORE STUDENT
SURVEY:
PRELIMINARY FINDINGS
Helen L. Chen, C2L Senior Scholar,
July 14, 2012 hlchen@stanford.edu

2. Overview
 What is the C2L Core Student Survey?
 Respondent demographics
 Frequency distributions of selected items
related to attitudes towards ePortfolios and
NSSE/CSSE
 Feedback scales – Faculty and Peers
 “Extending” scale
 Implications and Future Directions

3. What is the C2L Core Student
Survey?

4. C2L Core Student Survey
 WHAT: A survey instrument intended to capture
common data across diverse C2L institutions
 WHO: Students in ePortfolio courses and their
instructors
 WHERE: Administered online and f2f at 14 C2L
campuses representing a range of institutional
The C2L Core Survey was
types, students, and disciplines
informed by similar surveys used
 WHEN: First piloted in in the C2L network and also
Fall 2011 and again includes outcomes items from
in Spring 2012 NSSE/CSSE’s benchmarks for
effective educational practice.

5. C2L Core Student Survey Goals
1. Capture perspectives of the student
experience in courses with an ePortfolio
requirement or assignment – evidence
of ePortfolio impact
2. Ensure student voices are informing and
represented in the C2L developmental
model
3. Build a common data set across C2L
campuses and explore new analyses
beyond descriptive findings about

6. Who took the C2L Core Student
Survey?
Respondent Demographics

7. Respondent Demographics
 Total number of respondents: N=4,137
 Number of valid responses: N≈3,317
 Females (62.1%); Males (37.9%)
 Community college students (69.1%)
Senior college/university students (30.9%)
 Full-time (83.9%); Part-time (16.1%)
 18-23 y.o. (63%), 24-29 y.o. (19.2%), 30+
(17.8%)
 32 course types (top 3: Health, Liberal Arts,
English)

8. Frequency Distributions
Responses to selected survey items linked
to Integrative Learning

9. Level of Agreement on Selected ePortfolio
Attitudinal Items

10. Level of Agreement on NSSE/CSSE Outcomes

11. Contextualizing the C2L
Findings

12. Faculty Feedback Scale
What is the relationship between faculty
feedback and the ways students value their
ePortfolios?

13. “Faculty Feedback” Scale (α=.83)
Range: Strongly Disagree (1) to Strongly Agree (4)
Low (n=1951, 56.2%), Medium (n=319,
9.2%), High (n=1200, 34.6%); N=3470
 My instructor provided useful feedback on
my ePortfolio.
 I know that my instructor looked at my
ePortfolio.
 My instructor(s) discussed the ways
ePortfolio helps students to learn.

14. FACULTY FEEDBACK: Someday, I’d like to use my
ePortfolio to show what I’ve learned and what I can
do to others, such as potential employers or
professors at another college.

15. FACULTY FEEDBACK: Building my ePortfolio
helps me to think more deeply about the content
of this course.

16. FACULTY FEEDBACK: Building my
ePortfolio helped me to make connections
between ideas.

17. Peer Feedback Scale
What is the relationship between peer
feedback and the ways students value their
ePortfolios?

18. “Peer Feedback” Scale (α=.79)
Range: Strongly Disagree (1) to Strongly Agree (4)
Low (n=1503, 43.4%), Medium (n=1213,
35.0%), High (n=751, 21.7%); N=3467)
 My peers/classmates provided useful
feedback on my ePortfolio.
 I know my peers/classmates looked at my
ePortfolio.

19. PEER FEEDBACK: Building my ePortfolio
helps me to think more deeply about the
content of this course.

20. PEER FEEDBACK: Building my ePortfolio
helped me to make connections between
ideas.

21. Faculty & Peer Feedback on
NSSE/CSSE
What is the relationship between faculty
and peer feedback and NSSE/CSSE
learning outcomes?

22. FACULTY FEEDBACK: Synthesizing and
organizing ideas, information, or experiences in
new ways

23. PEER FEEDBACK: Synthesizing and
organizing ideas, information, or experiences
in new ways

24. FACULTY FEEDBACK: Extent to which this
course contributed to your understanding of
yourself

25. PEER FEEDBACK: Extent to which course
contributed to your understanding of yourself

26. Extending Scale
What is the relationship between students
taking personal ownership of their
ePortfolios and faculty feedback?

27. “Extending” Scale (α=.88)
Range: Strongly Disagree (1) to Strongly Agree (4)
Low (n=1385); Medium (n=1088); High (n=997);
N=3470
 I went beyond what was required for the course (for
example, creating extra pages or posting my own
links, text or photos).
 I included information or experience from other
courses I am taking or have taken.
 I included school activities or experiences outside of
the classroom (for example, clubs, sports,
internships, study abroad, etc.)
 I included information or experiences from other
areas of my life (for example, volunteering, work,
friends, family, community).

28. What is the relationship between
“extending” and faculty feedback?

29. High Extending
– High Faculty
Feedback
Low Extending
– Low Faculty
Feedback

30. Future Directions and Next
Steps
• for the development of the survey
instrument
• for guiding C2L research efforts going
forward

31. Next Steps: C2L Core Survey
Development
 What are some strategies for improving
response rate from students as well as
instructors?
 How representative is the C2L sample? How
generalizable are our findings?
 Are we asking the right questions? Are there
additional questions we should be asking of
students and/or instructors?
 How can we refine our list of course
types/disciplines into meaningful categories?

32. Next Steps: C2L Research
Questions
 What kind(s) of comparison group(s) would be
meaningful to explore (e.g., gender, institutional
type, etc.)? How can we contextualize our
findings?
 How do student perceptions of ePortfolio practices
differ across disciplines?
 How can we continue to explore and more deeply
understand the relationships among student
engagement, integrative learning, social
pedagogy?
 What is the value of the C2L core student survey
as an instrument for individual schools & the

33. Thank you!
 Jiyeon and Praveen
 The C2L leadership, especially Bret, Laura,
and Judit
 All of you!
Please contact me if you have any questions or
would be interested in collaborating on the
C2L core survey research efforts going
forward!
Helen L. Chen
hlchen@stanford.edu