Why the NSS matters to us

The comments and feedback made in the NSS are vital for MMU. Your feedback enables us to improve all aspects of the student experience. The NSS is one of several surveys throughout the academic year including an induction survey, Student Barometer, the online unit survey and a graduation survey.

All surveys, including the NSS, are important conduits for our students to give their personal feedback in an anonymous manner. In the past two years we have used your feedback to improve a wide range of services, facilities and the academic experience.

Understanding the NSS Questionnaire

The NSS uses various academic or student experience terms – this page gives a quick list of what these terms mean for students at MMU.

Do remember that the NSS is trying to ascertain how you feel about your entire MMU experience over the three or four years that you have been with us.

Comprising 23 questions, the survey is completed during the second and third terms of your final year, and has been running since 2005/06. For MMU, the aim is to give final year students the opportunity to feedback on their learning, teaching and overall student experience.

What does the NSS mean when they ask about…

• Teaching : refers to your personal teaching experience of the staff who have assisted you during your course – staff who make things interesting to you and explain with enthusiasm as well as challenging you to develop.
• Assessment and Feedback : relates to the quality of assessment and feedback from your teachers, tutors and peers on all aspects of your work = MMU feedback is given in formal marks of assessments, but also collectively in lectures, seminars, tutorials, and individually via academic advising and office hours
• Academic support : the person(s) who provide advice to you during your studies, at MMU this generally means your academic tutor, and can also include other academics and support staff who have assisted you throughout your studies.
• Organisation and Management : about the day to day experience being a student at MMU – did the timetable work, were lectures and tutorials on time and was the overall experience generally of your course running smoothly?
• Learning resources : this covers a wide range of the resources available to you as a student at MMU – including library, study materials, Moodle, study packs, periodicals, books and so on, across the full range of resources provided by the Library, IT Services and your course department.
• Personal development : this refers to the areas which assist with your personal skills, confidence, communication and ability to tackle new situations – think back to when you started at MMU and how you have changed from the experience and the input from the MMU staff and fellow students.
• Course : the whole degree programme which you are taking i.e. at MMU this is the degree course you are taking and your programme of study across the number of years that you have studied.

Who is eligible?

Students to be included in the NSS are selected through an automated process which identifies final year undergraduates and excludes the following groups of students:

• Those studying at postgraduate or further education level
• Those included in the NSS in the previous year, whether or not they responded
• Incoming or exchange students
• Those studying wholly overseas
• Those whose expected completion is not in the survey year
• Those whose course lasts 1 year or less, or 1 full time equivalent or less.

Get more detailed information on eligibility at the NSS website

Prize Draw
Terms and Conditions

The MMU NSS prize draw is open to eligible final year students who complete their National Student Survey online before 28th February 2013. Please note that the prize draw is made by Ipsos-MORI. We will contact winners of the main prizes by 14th March 2013 and the results will be announced on the Student Hub on 15th March 2013.

You may receive an invitation to participate in the survey even though you are not in your final year. We would urge you to still participate in the survey this time around, as this will represent your only chance to do so. All students are able to opt-out of the survey if they do not wish to complete it.

All winners will be emailed and given instructions on how to claim their prize. Winners of the iPad Mini prizes must be available for internal publicity before the close of spring term. Best of luck!

Opt out of the National Student Survey

If you would like to opt-out of the survey, you can do so by visiting the Student Survey website.

If you continue to receive NSS communications or have any problems opting-out, please send us an email at marketing@mmu.ac.uk.