What National and Local Surveys Tell Us About Our Students - and What It Means."
Tuesday, March 4, 3:15-4:45 p.m in Buntrock 142.
Presenters: Lynn Steen, Roberta Lembke
Respondents: Greg Kneser, Elizabeth Hutchins, John Hensel '05, Seth
Heringer '05.
Co-sponsored by the Library, IIT, Dean of Students,
and SGA
St. Olaf gathers a substantial amount of information
about our students through national and local surveys. Two national
surveys that have received considerable attention are the National
Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE)
and the Pew Internet and American Life Project. IIT also does periodic
surveys of student use of computers on campus. Taken together, these
surveys provide information that is valuable for all of us teaching
St. Olaf students. This session will present some highlights from
those surveys and begin a conversation about what the results may
mean for teaching our students.
As a preview, we provide the following True/False quiz. Correct answers will be provided on Tuesday.
- Ever since George Bush was elected, St. Olaf students
have become more liberal.
- 1/2 of today's college students began using computers
between the ages of 5 and 8.
- The major American religious tradition that is
least well represented at St. Olaf is Baptist.
- 73% of college students say they use the Internet
more than the library, while only 9% said they use the library
more than the Internet for information searching.
- Entering St. Olaf students are more able than are
freshmen at other colleges to be able to name a minority writer
or artist.
- The Library of Congress is the web site with the
highest proportion of college and university users.
- Twice as many men graduate with humanities majors
as enter with that intention.
- The IRP web site describes St. Olaf using only
100,000 numbers.
- 65% of St. Olaf students have their own computer.
