Most colleges survey their students to see what they think and what they want. But very few, if any of them, involve students in designing and applying the surveys, or interpreting the results.
At the RP Group conference this month, a gathering of research professionals working at California’s community colleges, Calbright staff and students showed how including students in this process can work, and that designing “with” students, not just “for” them, can lead to significant results.
“Last year we wanted to take the time to do a revamp of our student survey and we began by asking ourselves: ‘Who has not been at the table in that kind of conversation?’” said Dr. Rebecca Poon, Calbright’s Research Data Manager. “The clear answer was: students. We’re asking what they think but they’re not included in the process, and they should be.”
Students are so rarely brought into these processes that there were few existing best practices to guide Calbright’s Research and Innovation team. Since Calbright is also a research institution, testing new approaches and sharing them out with peer schools, Calbright’s team began recruiting students to be part of the effort. Over the next year, four different students participated in crucial parts of the survey process.
“They helped us redesign the survey experience, from making the survey questions more accessible to making the outreach efforts more personable,” Poon said. “They also helped us with the analysis to understand what students were saying and how we could make the insights actionable.”
It was a good process – both for the students involved and for the survey itself, which Poon said improved on a number of metrics. The response rate tripled, while the attrition rate – where students start but don’t complete the full survey–) fell from 25% to 3%. Qualitatively, Poon said “the students also helped us identify the key survey insights that will ensure Calbright prioritizes issues that matter.”
One of the student survey designers, Kalpana Ranganathan, who completed Calbright’s Data Analysis program and is currently studying in the CRM Platform Administration program, presented at RP Conference alongside the Calbright team – her first professional conference as a data analyst.
“It was so good to be a student and intern and travel the whole journey,” Kalpana said. “Sharing our co-designing process on the survey with the industry professionals who were there and engaging in the feedback and collaboration was definitely a great experience for me. It was a great opportunity for both my personal growth and also academic development.”
She said she was most proud of working with sample demographics, breaking down anonymous survey responses by the types of students who responded, preparing that data, and presenting it at a Calbright all-staff meeting ahead of the RP Group conference.
Calbright’s presentation, entitled “Seeing I to I (Input to Impact): Equitable Co-Design of the Student Experience Survey,” offered other California community colleges the best practices for including student participation in decision-making and design. It offered practical strategies for bringing student voices into the design efforts for any initiative that impacts students.
“Presenting at the RP Group conference was a meaningful opportunity for Calbright’s Research and Development team to share how we’re reimagining student success through equitable co-design – centering student voices not just in the data we collect, but in how we shape our tools and take action,” said Binh Do, Calbright’s Vice President of Research and Development.
“Inviting Kalpana to be a co-presenter, seeing her share her perspective and expertise with a room full of educators, made the experience especially powerful,” Do said. “It reminded us why inclusive collaboration isn’t just important – it’s essential to building truly student centered institutions.”
