Focus on Chemnitz students

Project „Studienerfolg Pro“ investigates student success and its difficulties along the way – survey of winter semester 2016/17 has begun

The bachelor’s degree is the proof of acquired competences and knowledge. But there is more to academic success than to receive one’s degree in graduation cap and gown. The Chemnitz University views student success as a significant indicator for high-quality university education. The Germany-wide higher education policy often uses success and failure rates as control instruments, thus it is important to take a closer look behind the scenes. Aim of the project network “Studienerfolg Pro” – consisting of the federally funded project TU4U and the project “Kohortenanalyse” of the State Ministry for Education, Research and the Arts - is to deal with the key factors to student success at the Chemnitz University of Technology and how to increase and maintain the level of success through institutional measures. Sustainable data process and analytic instruments are to be developed for the utilization in future determination of success parameters on academic success.

In a pilot survey, first-semester students were surveyed on their choice on the Chemnitz University, their experiences in the first semester and their satisfaction with study and university, in order to get a first picture on the view of the students. The survey is going until June 8, 2017. All bachelor and teacher students are asked to participate for a preferably representative result. The link to the survey is sent to students of the winter semester 2017/17 via email to their TU-mail accounts. The participation in the survey is motivated by a lottery for Uni-Shop vouchers among all participants.

The project network “Studienerfolg Pro” plans to develop a continuous student panel survey, meaning that the same students will be interviewed over their complete period of study. This is supposed to show various influencing factors on student success throughout the study progress at different times. At the same time, specific analyses on individual age groups or cohorts will then be possible. The identified fields of problem (i.e. critical subjects, exam load and specific study conditions) are to be taken up in order to develop respective supporting measures together with the help of the faculties, the central institutions, and the central university administration. The data-based results will be communicated and presented to the university public. Thus, the discussion on student success is brought into the university.

Further information on the project network “Studienerfolg Pro” and the first-year student survey: https://www.tu-chemnitz.de/studienerfolg-pro

Contact: Anne Sanders, phone +49 371 531 38482, email anne.sanders@hrz.tu-chemnitz.de

Matthias Fejes
01.06.2017

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