Australasian Higher Education Evaluation Forum (AHEEF) 2008"Evidence based Decision Making: Scholarship and Practice"

2-3 October, 2008Australasian Higher Education Evaluation Forum (AHEEF)

2008"Evidence based Decision Making: Scholarship and Practice"

2-3 October, 2008

Students’ perceived motivation to learn:

consistency across units

Beatrice Tucker and Julie-Ann Pegden

eVALUate – unit survey

Quantitative items Ask students their level of agreement• What helps their achievement of the learning

outcomes (items 1-7)

• Their level of motivation & engagement (items 8-10)

• Overall satisfaction (item 11)

Qualitative items1. What are the most helpful aspects of the unit?

2. How might the unit be improved?

Motivation

8. I am motivated to achieve the learning outcomes in this unit. Being motivated means having the desire or drive to learn, to complete tasks and to willingly strive for goals.

Previous Research Findings

Higher % agreement motivation• *Females • *Part-time students• *International students• *Older students (26 yrs+)• *PG students• *External students• *Higher grades (SWA)• Health and Humanities vs Business and

especially * Science and Engineering.

Research questions

1. Are students consistent in their reported level of motivation across units?

2. If so – what are their characteristics?

3. What factors motivate them? – what do they say?

Method

Identified all student responses:– enrolled in 3 or more units– same reported agreement (motivation)

• SA = strongly agree • A = agree• D or SD = disagree or strongly disagree

– exclusions – UJ or blankQualitative comments analysed using SPSS

Text Analysis for Surveys

Results

eVALUate event – Semester 1, 2006

– 1,911 units

– response rate 28.9% by 32.7% students

– 25,090 surveys submitted by 8,379 students

Results

No students enrolled in 3+ units = 4983

Inconsistent agreement (motivation)

= 76.7% (n = 3822)

Consistent level of agreement (motivation)

• SA = 4.2% (n = 207)• A = 16.3% (n = 812)• D or SD = 1.0% (n = 52)

Demographics

Strongly agree

• Females 61%• Australian

students 69%

Disagree/strongly disagree

• Males 62%• Australian

students 73%

Faculty

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Humanities CBS Sc & Eng Health

No

. stu

den

ts

Strongly Agree Disagree

Year of program

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

1 2 3 4 5

No

. stu

den

ts

Strongly Agree Disagree

Age (years)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

< 20 21-25 26-35 36-45 46+

No

. stu

den

ts

Strongly Agree Disagree

Grade average (percentage)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

< 50% 50-59% 60-69% 70-79% 80-89% 90+%

No

. stu

den

ts

Strongly Agree Disagree

What do students say – SA

What do students say – D / SD

D/SD students tracked

Semester / year

• Sem 2 2006 • Sem 1 2007 • Sem 2 2007

No. of students who were no longer enrolled

1022 (14 + 8 graduated)28 (16 +12 graduated)

24 still enrolled

ConclusionStudents who consistently SA tend to

be – female– studying in Health– 1st year– aged less than 25 years– achieve a grade average of 60 – 80%

Comment on – teachers and unit (learning experiences, assessments)

ConclusionStudents who consistently D/SD

– males – studying in Science and Engineering– 1st, 2nd, and 3rd year – aged less than 25 years– achieve a grade average of 80% or less

• Comment on – need more information and help, organisation, assessments

• Many of these students leave course.