UNIVERSITY OF RHODE ISLAND
FACULTY SENATE
FACULTY SENATE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE REPORT
SURVEY FALL 2004
Background:
Early during this academic year, the Faculty Senate Executive Committee decided
to administer an informal questionnaire to University faculty, students,
staff, and administrators in an attempt to develop a broader and better understanding
of issues which concerned those constituencies at URI. Since this was a first
attempt at this sort of thing, it was decided to keep the questionnaire deliberately
simple--basically a half sheet on which respondents were asked to jot down
as many as three issues at the University that concerned them and to check
off their faculty/staff/student/administrator affiliation. A version of the
questionnaire was distributed at the September 23rd Faculty Senate meeting.
The results were encouraging and approximately 1200 additional copies were
distributed to almost all academic departments and to many administrative
units at the University. Processing the questionnaires involved an attempt
to sort the responses into a small set of general categories (which had not
been identified beforehand) and tabulating--overall and by affiliation--the
number of responses that fell into each category.
With responses still trickling in, a preliminary tabulation was distributed
and a brief oral report was given at the November 18th Faculty Senate meeting.
A more complete report was promised for later and this report is intended
to fulfill that promise.
Tabulation:
A total of 250 responses to the questionnaire were received. As mentioned
above, the responses were sorted into a set of 18 analyst-identified categories
and tabulated, with the tabulations presented both overall and by affiliation.
The appended bar charts present the tabulations, with the analyst-identified
categories shown at the left of each chart. See http://www.uri.edu/facsen/FSEC_Survey_Charts.pdf
The group affiliation of six respondents could not be identified; their responses
are included in the “all responses” chart but not elsewhere. Only seven responses
identified as administrators were received. Given the small number of responses,
no bar chart is shown for that group.
Comments:
In the aftermath and judging from comments received both in the questionnaires
and during the preliminary report at the Senate Meeting of November 18, there
seems to be a consensus that the general idea of a pro-active attempt to
survey the concerns of faculty, students, staff, and administrators at URI
has value. The results of this initial attempt are suggestive and useful;
but, as was pointed out in the preliminary report, the informal nature of
the questionnaire and survey methods left much to be desired. In particular,
although some respondents commented positively about the totally open format
of the questionnaire, the determination of categories into which responses
could be categorized was rather subjective, as was the classification of
some responses into the decided-upon categories. On the other hand, too great
a proliferation of categories would make understanding and using the results
unwieldy.
Even so, we have used these results, or the preliminary version, as a basis
for discussion amongst the members of the FSEC, with the members of the Joint
Strategic Planning Committee (JSPC), and with several University administrators
(Provost, Vice President for Business, etc.). These discussions have contributed
to efforts to have the University administration clarify and make explicit
various University policies and procedures (e.g.., travel) and to implement
a mechanism to have some identified person or persons in each “unit” responsible
for answering questions about University procedures. By this report, we further
are making the results generally available in the hopes that they may lead
to some thoughtful consideration and discussion of possible “trouble-spots”
or areas of concern that might usefully be addressed.
Recommendations:
As intimated, there seems to be agreement that a questionnaire surveying
the concerns of faculty, students, staff and administration, and administered
through the FSEC, can have significant value. Given our experience with this
first attempt it is clear that the survey needs to be more carefully constructed
and administered and further, needs to be administered in a timeframe (e.g.,
during the spring semester) so that the results could more usefully inform
and guide the activities of the FSEC and the Senate.
To help accomplish this, the FSEC recommends that the Senate pass the following
resolution:
Resolved, that the 2005-06 Faculty Senate Executive Committee
and subsequent FSECs
• are urged to continue development of survey instruments to help identify
major concerns of faculty, students, staff, and administrators;
• are urged to enlist the help of faculty experts in the design, development,
and administration of such instruments;
• are urged to retain some form of open endedness in the instruments;
• are urged to consider administering such instruments during the spring
semester of each academic year;
• are urged to distribute the results generally as well as to specific individuals
and campus organizations which may be able to make use of or respond to them;
• and are urged to consider the results of such surveys to help guide the
activities of the FSEC and Senate.