Postgraduate student satisfaction: A multilevel analysis of PTES data

Abstract

Student satisfaction has received growing attention in Higher Education systems in recent years, and are increasingly used for internal and external accountability in the sector. This does leave us with questions on the extent to which variance in student satisfaction can be explained by Higher Education Institution (HEI) and course attended rather than by individual student characteristics; and on what factors may predict student satisfaction. In this study we used the Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey (PTES) to look at these questions in a sample of approximate 70000 UK postgraduate students from 100 HEI's. Firstly, confirmatory factor analyses were used to test the validity of the proposed multidimensional structure of student satisfaction in PTES. Then multilevel models were used to look at variance at three levels (HEI, course and student), and the relationships between institutional and student factors collected in PTES and student satisfaction. Two years of data (2014 and 2015) were used. Findings suggest that over 90% of variance is explained at the student level for all dimensions of student satisfaction in both years, with variance at the HEI level being particularly low. Individual student characteristics explain more variance than institutional characteristics, but only some (such as BME status) are significant, and explained variance is low. These findings suggest using student satisfaction as an accountability measure in HE may be highly problematic.

Teacher personality domains and facets: Their unique associations with student-ratings of teaching quality and teacher enthusiasm

“…For example, teacher self-reported teaching quality and enthusiasm may be biased by teaching ideals or self-serving strategies (Wubbels et al, 1992), while classroom observations tend to be expensive and time-consuming and provide only a snapshot of classroom events (Scherzinger & Wettstein, 2019). Likewise, the validity of student-ratings can be compromised by students' insufficient knowledge of methodology and didactics (Wagner, 2008) and/or colored by teacher popularity and grades they obtain (Aleamoni, 1999;Muijs & Bokhove, 2017). Despite these drawbacks, students are considered to be an excellent source of information on classroom processes (Montuoro & Lewis, 2015) since they are the direct and regular observers of teaching, they can compare different teachers, and they tend to have strong opinions on who the 'good' and 'bad' teachers are (Muijs & Reynolds, 2018).…”

Input resources indicators in use for accreditation purpose of higher education institutions

“…Indicator S 18 is obtained from surveys that should include questions about organization and management, teaching quality, learning resources, academic and non-academic supports, and personal development. Examples of such surveys include those of Bell and Brooks (2017) and Gruber et al (2010) that were conducted at the undergraduate level, and Muijs and Bokhove (2017) which were conducted at the postgraduate level.…”

Development and psychometric evaluation of postgraduate nursing student academic satisfaction scale

“…Due to the difference between postgraduate and the bachelor courses, the results of previous studies that focused more on undergraduate students (Dennison & El‐Masri, 2012; Smith et al., 2018) are not generalizable to postgraduate students. In addition, it should be noted that postgraduate students have higher levels of academic competence, are more mature than undergraduates and have a more advanced perspective about education (Muijs & Bokhove, 2017). They are faced with new challenges and different experiences such as doing the thesis/dissertation or research project dissertation (Muijs & Bokhove, 2017) and supervisor‐student interaction (Ahmadi et al., 2020; Mainhard et al., 2009).…”

“…In addition, it should be noted that postgraduate students have higher levels of academic competence, are more mature than undergraduates and have a more advanced perspective about education (Muijs & Bokhove, 2017). They are faced with new challenges and different experiences such as doing the thesis/dissertation or research project dissertation (Muijs & Bokhove, 2017) and supervisor‐student interaction (Ahmadi et al., 2020; Mainhard et al., 2009). Unlike most undergraduate students who have to work in a clinical setting after graduation, postgraduate students have more job opportunities in the areas of research, education, policymaking, management and leadership (Haghdoost et al., 2015; Rautiainen & Vallimies‐Patomäki, 2016; Wilkinson et al., 2018).…”

“…Due to the difference between postgraduate and the bachelor courses, the results of previous studies that focused more on undergraduate students (Dennison & El-Masri, 2012;Smith et al, 2018) are not generalizable to postgraduate students. In addition, it should be noted that postgraduate students have higher levels of academic competence, are more mature than undergraduates and have a more advanced perspective about education (Muijs & Bokhove, 2017).…”