NSS: Which department offers the best perks?

The National Student Survey (NSS) is a UK-wide questionnaire circulated by the Office for Students, a higher education watchdog, which polls final-year undergraduate students’ opinions on their degree. Run yearly since 2005, it is one of the most authoritative sources of student satisfaction data.

Felix compiled information on the approaches adopted by departments at Imperial College to encourage students to fill in the NSS. Please note that while all efforts have been made to provide an accurate summary of these approaches, not all departments responded to our queries, and some of the information below might be outdated – so check the most recent communication from your department.

Some departments promise to organise events or raffles should specific NSS response thresholds be met. Subject to confirmation, the Department of Mathematics is planning a pizza party at a 40% response threshold, and a donut party at 60%. The Department of Aeronautical Engineering is promising students a raffle for an Amazon voucher should 70% of them fill in the NSS.

Other departments are more specific, with Life Sciences offering a £15 voucher to students completing the NSS in the last week of Spring term only, after final year projects have started. Physicists who completed the survey also got the opportunity to collect a donut and put their name down for a £15 Amazon voucher.

Indiscriminate snack giveaways are an alternative strategy. The Department of Computing is planning informal weekly drop-in sessions with hot drinks and snacks.

Overall, advice from the OfS recognising that “incentives and prize draws are both proven to be effective in improving response rates” seems to have been understood.

You can complete the 27 questions of the NSS here. If you do so (and, as a matter of fact, even if you don’t), you are welcome to come into the Felix office and grab a free copy of the newspaper and cup of coffee.