About 9 out of 10 of our seniors would choose to attend TTU if they had to start over again, according to the latest results of The National Survey of Student Engagement administered this spring.

The survey reported that 86 percent of TTU seniors would choose the same institution if they had to start over, compared to 80 percent making a similar decision at peer institutions.

"The survey provides a useful picture of TTU's strengths and weaknesses. Overall, TTU did quite well," says Barry Stein, Planning Office Director.

"Seniors at TTU rated their overall educational experience significantly higher than seniors at our peers," says Stein. "The survey also identified a few areas of potential weakness that TTU could focus on to improve freshmen retention."

The NSSE survey is designed to obtain information about the types of experiences and activities students are engaged in during their college experience. The survey evaluates experiences and activities that impact both learning and personal development.

NSSE selects a random sample of freshmen and seniors at each participating institution. The overall response rate for the sample taken here this spring was 36 percent, with 308 freshmen and 531 seniors responding to the survey.

Our university is compared to a large group of peer institutions from the same basic Carnegie classification. For this survey, our peers included in-state institutions such as Belmont University, Middle Tennessee State University and UT-Chattanooga, as well as out-of-state institutions such as Western Carolina University, Xaviar University and Villanova University.

Colleges and universities across the country use NSSE data to identify aspects of the undergraduate experience inside and outside the classroom that can be improved through changes in policies and practices more consistent with good practices in undergraduate education.

Stein says TTU also uses the survey results to measure notable areas of strengths and weaknesses relevant to our Vision and Strategic Plan.

One notable area of strength relating to these areas reported by freshman and seniors was the use of computing and information technology. Areas that indicated room for improvement included writing clearly and effectively and understanding and interacting with people of other racial and ethnic backgrounds.

In the first 6 years, more than 970 different colleges and universities have participated in NSSE. More than 550 colleges and universities participated in the spring 2006 administration.