Understanding the ESS subject report

Within the end of subject survey (ESS), students are asked to rate aspects of the subject on a five point scale from strongly disagree to strongly agree, alongside an additional two open-ended questions.

These confidential responses are collected and provided in the subject report, allowing for review and evaluation of student feedback on each delivery of a subject.

The title page contains information about the subject, including its year, campus, and teaching unit.

On the second page is a statistical table of the results relating to the subject.

Screenshot of ESS subject report

Table headings and what they mean

Resp. #

Shows the number of responses to each question. This number will also be used later to help calculate the mean, standard deviation, and error values.

SD D N A SA

These are the 5 point scale of responses:

  • SD = strongly disagree
  • D = disagree
  • N = neither agree nor disagree
  • A = agree
  • SA = strongly agree

Below each in the table of results is the number of responses for that option on the scale.

Mean

The mean provides an overall average score that reflects the students’ collective responses. The result will be a number between 1 and 5, where a higher score indicates that students agreed more with the statements provided. Conversely, a lower value suggests students disagreed with the statement in relation to the subject.

The mean is calculated by assigning a number value to each response based on its position on the scale as follows:

  • 1 for strongly disagree
  • 2 for disagree
  • 3 for neither agree nor disagree
  • 4 for agree
  • 5 for strongly agree.

Each response is then given its corresponding value, and all response values are added together. This total is then divided by the number of responses.

Standard deviation (Std. Dev.)

The standard deviation that indicates how varied the responses are around the mean. A larger standard deviation means there is a wider range of views among the students about the subject, where a lower one indicates responses were closer together.

Standard error (Std. Err.)

The standard error indicates how closely the mean is likely to match an assumed average if all students had responded. In surveys not everyone responds, so the mean is used as an estimate. The standard error helps us understand how close that estimate is likely to be.

For example, if the mean score is 3.89 with a standard error of 0.29, we believe the value of the mean is between 3.60 and 4.18 (3.89 ± 0.29). The standard error depends on two factors: the number of responses and the standard deviation.

If this year’s mean is 3.89 and last year’s mean was 3.80, but the standard error is 0.29 (ie larger than the difference between the two means), this would not support that there has been a significant improvement as the observed difference is within the range of variability suggested by the standard error.

Free text responses

Following the aggregate statistics table, two additional sections are shown with the free text responses from students to two open-ended questions:

  • What aspects of this subject were the most helpful for your learning?
  • What would have improved your learning experience in this subject?

Currently, we do not provide any text or theme based analysis of these responses but they may provide valuable insight to the students' opinion of the subject and its delivery at the University.

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