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NSS and the Teaching Excellence Framework : five myths and one truth

8 March 2017

We are keen to give you some clarity about the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) and how it relates to the National Student Survey (NSS) so have compiled a list of myth busters for your information.

NSS and the Teaching Excellence Framework: five myths and one truth

We’ve heard lots of stories circulating about the NSS and its links to the TEF, so we thought we should help address some of your queries:

Myth 1: The TEF means fee increases of thousands of pounds for all UK students

It’s important to note that participating in TEF would allow universities (if they meet the required standards) to keep their fees in line with inflation (or in some cases less than inflation) only. Whilst costs have gone up, the £9000 fee has remained static since the fee cap was set 4 years ago. Rather than rectifying this by allowing all universities to raise tuition fees in line with inflation, the government is aiming to ensure that only universities that can demonstrate high quality teaching are allowed inflationary rises. This mean a university that achieves a TEF rating in 2017 of gold, silver or bronze can raise their fees in line with the inflation forecast in 2018/19 only (so around £250-300). In subsequent years, only universities with a gold or silver TEF rating will be able to track inflation fully. For bronze rated institutions, they will be able to track half of inflation. 

Myth 2: The university gets paid for good response rates i.e. the percentage of students who fill out the NSS

We’re not quite sure where this rumour surfaced from but this is not the case, we aren’t paid for our responses. We always aim to ensure that we get a high response rate so that the data is reliable and as representative as possible of our student body. The important point here is that there is a minimum response rate threshold of 50% for the NSS. If the overall response rate for the university is less than 50%, we don’t receive any NSS results so your voice will not be heard.

Myth 3: If I don’t fill out the NSS and we don’t reach the 50% threshold for response rates, the TEF won’t go ahead

Also not true. The government has indicated that, should this happen, they will continue to operate the TEF process using data from 2013-16 instead, meaning that the information provided to prospective students about the quality of education at UCL will not reflect the current picture and the voice of the current cohort will not be heard.  Plus the NSS scores are just part of a package of data, as well as a written submission, that the TEF will use to assess teaching quality. 

Myth 4: The NSS doesn’t measure teaching quality

This is a half-myth - something as complex as teaching quality is a challenge to measure, so what the NSS does is measure student satisfaction with a whole range of aspects of teaching, focusing on questions such as ‘The course is intellectually stimulating’ or ‘My course has challenged me to achieve my best work’. This then allows us to identify areas for improvement and give targeted support to our departments to help them achieve it.

Myth 5: UCL fully supports the links between the TEF and NSS

Actually, we know the proposals aren’t perfect but we support the focus of the TEF to improve the quality of teaching in universities and to give students more information. As an institution we’ve raised our concerns about linking the NSS and the TEF but we are much more likely to be able to influence and shape the TEF by being part of it than by sitting outside the process. For us, the most important thing is to improve the student experience and this was a priority long before TEF came along. To make these improvements, we need NSS scores.

Fact: The NSS drives change

The reality is that many of the changes that have happened at UCL, from longer library opening hours to the continuing improvements to assessment and feedback on your work, are down to the NSS. It is one of the most powerful tools we have for understanding what is important to you, and not participating means you will not have a voice in this process. 

For more information about the NSS and the link with TEF, then please take the time to read our FAQs and find out more about what it means on the You Shape UCL website.