Course Experience Questionnaire
The Course Experience Questionnaire investigates the opinions of recent graduates regarding their course experience. It is a component of the national Australian Graduate Survey that is conducted twice a year by Griffith in association with Graduate Careers Australia.
The Course Experience Questionnaire contains several multi-item scales designed to assess various aspects of students' course experiences. Since 2002, individual institutions have been able to tailor it by combining the three 'core' scales (Good Teaching, Generic Skills and Overall Satisfaction) with ones from the eight optional scales.
Since 2005 Griffith has used the following optional scales:
- Learning Community Scale
- Graduate Qualities Scale
Course Experience Questionnaire Scales
Required 'Core' Scales
Good Teaching Scale
The Good Teaching Scale assesses the degree to which graduates feel that the teaching staff of their course provided a high level of teaching quality. Specifically, higher scores are achieved when graduates feel they received adequate feedback on their progress, that the course was presented in an interesting and motivating manner and when teaching staff were perceived to make an effort to understand students problems and attempt to explain things clearly.
Generic Skills Scale
The Generic Skills Scale gauges the extent to which the course adds to the generic skills that graduates might be expected to possess. Whilst discipline-specific skills and knowledge are often crucial to career prospects, there is a general consensus that specific knowledge can often become obsolete whereas more generic skills should endure and be applicable in a variety of contexts. The types of generic skills assessed include decision-making skills, problem-solving skills, analytic skills, written communication skills, planning skills, and general ability to address unique problems.
Overall Satisfaction Item
This single item asks the graduates to indicate their level of overall satisfaction with their completed course. Higher scores on this item indicate higher satisfaction levels.
Optional Scales
Clear Goals and Standards
The Clear Goals and Standards Scale assesses the degree to which graduates feel they were provided with enough information regarding the learning objectives of their course and the standards of work expected from them. Stress caused by ambiguity regarding expectations will often detract from a student's overall learning experience and may also interfere with academic performance.
Appropriate Assessment Scale
The Appropriate Assessment Scale evaluates the extent to which courses depend on the recollection of factual knowledge for assessment purposes. Over-reliance on factual recall is generally considered to be inappropriate for assessment in higher education courses and indeed for many types of courses. Graduates are asked to indicate if they felt their assessment was overly concerned with the memorisation of facts, with higher scale scores indicating less reliance on factual recall and a greater focus on higher-order learning.
Appropriate Workload
The Appropriate Workload Scale assesses the degree to which graduates felt the workload involved in their course was excessive. Research has demonstrated that when excessive demands are placed on students they tend to adopt a learning style that involves skimming across the surface of topics without gaining a thorough understanding of the material. Not only does this result in poorer academic performance, but also detracts from the students overall enjoyment of the learning process. Higher scores on this scale indicate more acceptable workload levels.
Student Support Scale
The Student Support Scale asks graduates to indicate their level of satisfaction with a number of support services made available to them during their course. Specifically, the scale looks at library services, access to information technology resources, course and careers advice, learning resources and health, welfare and counselling services.
Learning Resources Scale
The Learning Resources Scale also assesses student support services, but focuses more on the library and information technology resources. Also included in this scale are the quality of course-related materials and the availability of study resources.
Learning Community Scale
The Learning Community Scale gauges the sense of community experienced by graduates whilst studying a course. The notion of a learning community refers to an environment in which students are encouraged to explore new ideas and are encouraged to share knowledge in an intellectually stimulating setting. The scale assesses not only the degree to which graduates perceived a learning community, but also the extent to which they felt they belonged to that community.
Graduate Qualities Scale
The Graduate Qualities Scale is similar to the Generic Skills Scale in that it assesses a number of general skills that are not specific to the area of study. The scale also addresses how the courses contributed towards the graduates enthusiasm for further learning and how they value other diverse perspectives and ideas.
Intellectual Motivation Scale
The Intellectual Motivation Scale evaluates how well a course of study motivates students to learn and the degree to which they find the course intellectually stimulating. This scale tends to overlap both the Good Teaching Scale and the Overall Satisfaction Item.
National Course Experience Questionnaire Results
Course Experience Questionnaire data for all institutions (based on field of education and qualification) are available from the Universities Australia website.