Office for Students launches consultation on publication of the National Student Survey

The 2023 survey has been updated with revised and additional questions to gain more in-depth data about students’ perceptions of their academic experience. These updates have necessitated changes to how the NSS results will be presented.

The NSS is managed by the Office for Students (OfS) on behalf of the regulatory and funding bodies in the UK, which are the OfS in England, Higher Education Funding Council Wales, Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland and Scottish Funding Council.

The key proposals include:

• Replacing the agreement rate with a ‘positivity measure’ to analyse students’ responses
• Continuing to group the questions thematically with the new questions to aid understanding and analysis of the data, with areas covering teaching on the course, academic support, mental wellbeing and, in England only, freedom of expression.
• Splitting the data with further students’ personal characteristics to better understand students who are benefitting less from their educational experience than others.

One of the largest student voice surveys in the world, the NSS receives around 330,000 responses each year. The survey asks students about their academic experience, including teaching, support from teaching staff, learning resources and student voice. To ensure the survey remains fit for purpose, it is regularly reviewed. The revised questionnaire has moved to more direct questions to improve accuracy and validity, and the proposals in this consultation aim to reduce the burden and maximise interpretation so that universities and colleges are better informed on students’ academic experiences.

Universities, colleges, students and other organisations are welcome to submit their views on how the NSS data will be published. The deadline for submissions is 26 May 2023.

Notes 

1. Read about the updated NSS 2023 survey.