Engagement and the Working Student
Common wisdom would suggest that the more time away from campus, the less likely it is that a student can engage in campus activities. In fact, national studies have shown that working off-campus in particular can have a negative effect on students’ engagement in educationally purposeful activities. Analysis of the responses to the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE)[1] shows that, on average, DePaul seniors spend more hours per week working off-campus than the typical college student, However, the number of hours worked appeared unrelated to reported levels of engagement. Seniors working more than twenty hours per week reporting being just as engaged as those who did not work off-campus at all.
Hours Worked
Students are asked to indicate on the NSSE the number of hours in a typical week they work off-campus. The chart shows the percentage of students who reported working more than 20 hours per week by institution type. DePaul seniors (and those at other urban institutions) work at a much higher rate than seniors at the Carnegie[2] peer institutions and schools nationwide. For three of the last five years, a higher percentage of DePaul seniors reported working more than twenty hours per week than seniors at the other urban institutions.
Engagement and Work
Overall, DePaul seniors report a higher level of student engagement than do seniors at peer institutions (see Link). Does the number of hours worked affect that level of student engagement? From the 2008 survey, seniors were grouped by the number of hours worked and their NSSE benchmark scores in five critical areas were compared. As shown in the figure, there is very little difference in the scores on NSSE’s five benchmarks of effective educational practice by number of hours worked off-campus. Across all five benchmarks, the scores for those who work 20 or more hours per week were not significantly different from those who reported not working. Thus, while DePaul seniors tend to work more hours per week off-campus than the typical college senior, this does not seriously affect their reported levels of engagement.
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[1] For the last several years, DePaul has participated in the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE, commonly referred to as the “nessie”) which asks first-year freshmen and transfer students, and senior students, the extent to which they engage in educational practices that have been empirically linked to various desirable institutional outcomes. Through their research, the folks at NSSE have gathered information on student behaviors and institutional features and created five Benchmarks of Effective Educational Practice:
- Level of Academic Challenge
- Active and Collaborative Learning
- Student-Faculty Interaction
- Enriching Educational Experiences
- Supportive Campus Environment
These benchmarks have multiple items associated with each, the responses for which were combined statistically to yield benchmark scores and comparative data. Since the scores for each benchmark fall on a scale from 1-100, the relative strength of one benchmark vis-a vis the others can be assessed.
[2] For over three decades, the Carnegie Classification has been the leading framework for describing institutional diversity in U.S. higher education in terms of programs taught, student profile, and institutional size and setting. DePaul’s Carnegie classification is Doctoral/Research University in that we award at least 20 doctoral degrees per year (excluding doctoral-level degrees that qualify recipients for entry into professional practice, such as the JD, MD, PharmD, DPT, etc.), but we do not have a high research activity.