Student engagement reflects how students connect with their learning, their instructors, their peers, and the support available to them. It offers colleges a valuable way to understand what students experience, where barriers may exist, and which institutional practices can help students make progress toward their goals.
Engagement matters because student success is shaped not only by what students bring to college, but also by what they encounter once they arrive. Clear expectations, meaningful interaction, timely feedback, effective support, and a sense of connection can all influence whether students remain engaged in their education.
CCCSE surveys help colleges examine these experiences through student and faculty voices.
How Engagement Data Can Help
The resulting data can help institutions:
- Identify strengths and areas for improvement
- Understand differences in students’ experiences
- Focus campus conversations on evidence
- Inform teaching, support, and institutional strategy
- Track change over time and compare results with national data
From Information to Action
The goal is not simply to collect information. It is to help colleges listen more intentionally, ask better questions, and make informed decisions that improve the student experience.
Foundations of Student Engagement Research
CCCSE’s work is grounded in a longstanding body of research connecting students’ involvement in educationally purposeful activities with learning, persistence, and attainment.
Foundational contributions include Involvement in Learning, Chickering and Gamson’s “Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education,” research synthesized in How College Affects Students and Leaving College, and George Kuh’s work on student engagement and good educational practice.
References
Chickering, A. W., & Gamson, Z. F. (1987). Seven principles for good practice in undergraduate education. AAHE Bulletin, 3–7. [eric.ed.gov]
Kuh, G. D. (2001). Assessing what really matters to student learning: Inside the National Survey of Student Engagement. Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, 33(3), 10–17, 66. View the ERIC record. [eric.ed.gov]
National Institute of Education, Study Group on the Conditions of Excellence in American Higher Education. (1984). Involvement in learning: Realizing the potential of American higher education. U.S. Department of Education. View the ERIC record. [eric.ed.gov], [books.google.com]
Pascarella, E. T., & Terenzini, P. T. (1991). How college affects students: Findings and insights from twenty years of research. Jossey-Bass. [eric.ed.gov], [scirp.org]
Tinto, V. (1993). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition (2nd ed.). University of Chicago Press. View the ERIC record. [scirp.org], [eric.ed.gov]