学勢調査2010

Abstract/ Graph/ Question/ University's Response/ Japanese

 

Recommendation from Student Census 2010

March 2011

By All Student Survery Staff Members

Table of Contents

1     Introduction. 2

2     Summary of Student Census 2

3     Key Recommendations Applicable to All Sectors 4

4     Outline of of Recommendations on Specific Items 12

 

1           Introduction

It was the third time for us to conduct this Student Census, and we are proud to report to you that the survey has been instrumental in introducing better systems and resolving frustrations of students. It has been and will continue to be appreciated as a meaningful tool by the university as well as its students in improving this academic environment of ours. In preparing this recommendation, we, the student staff members did our best in honoring the opinions of every student who responded in the survey in order to reflect them as closely as possible in the recommendation. In preparing the recommendation, we conducted numerous discussions and open meetings in the campus simultaneously obtaining many advices from our faculty members as well. We hope you read this recommendation with the understandings of such a background and basic intentions to appreciate as much as possible.

The entire staff members wish to express our deepest gratitude to all the faculty members and students who helped us in preparing this recommendation of Student Census 2010.

 

2           Summary of Student Census

Student Census is a survey of students intended to improve educational programs, facilities, and general services throughout the university using questionnairs that ask specific questions to and collecting answers from students in order to make TokyoTech a more attractive place of learning. Student Census is an initiative unique to TokyoTech, and is named using an analogy from population census of a nation. After a trial in 2004, Student Census is officially conducted for the first time in 2005 as a system for the students to analyze themselves and make recommendations to the university. Student Census 2010 is the third survey, and the opinions of students in the past two surveys played a big role in communication between the students and the admistration of the university.

The total number of students who responded in the current Student Census (hereinafter referrred to as “Current Student Census“) is twice as many as in the same survey conducted in 2005, and the largest ever in this survey (total number of responding students 2,343 relative to the total number of students of 9,588 consisting of 4,850 undergraduate students, 3,484 master course students, and 1,524 doctor course students). See Fig. 1-1. Especially notable in the current Student Census was the increase of responses from international students, thanks to the agressive approoach to international students.

Fig. 1-1 Trend in Number of Respondents in Student Census

In a conventional student life survey, lives and opinions of students are surveyed by university faculty members to be reported to the universiy in order for the report to be reflected upon the policy of the university. Under such a method, the university may end up introducing new services and facilities without accurately grasping the opinions and behaviours of the students, so that the new services may not respond to what the students really wanted. On the contrary, in our Student Census, the survey is not only executed, but also designed and prepared by the student staff members by themselves. Since our census has more tighter bond between the survey result and the improvement plan compared to the conventional survey, the university can provide a service that matches the students‘ request. What we have accomplished so far includes refurbishing of lecture halls, installation of electronic bulletin boards, improvement of the refresh room, and instroduction of a convenience store. Moreover, the faculty seems to have better understandings of students’ needs so that the survey seems to playing a role of minimizing the mismatches of understandings between the faculty and the students and strudents’ frustrations. 

Fig. 1-2 shows the relative roles of the university, students, Student Census and staff.

Fig. 1-2 Relative Roles of University, Students, Student Census, and Staff

3           Key Recommendations Applicable to All Sectors

Outline of the Recommendations

One of the geneeral tendencies noticed in the survey was “the lack of communications between the students and the university. This was noticed already in the Student Census 2008, and a recommendation for improvement was made. As a result, some improvements were nticeable in the area of information delivery from the university to the students. However, it was also learned that there still remain problems in recognizing each other’s positions between the university and the students. In order to solve the problem, we believe it is necessary to build a system that facilicate the students to express their opinions and to find means of grasping needs of the students and promoting mutual understandings.

Analysis of the Curent Situation

Various facilities have been added based on the previous Student Census. Unfortunately, however, it was learned through the current Student Census that some of those facilities are not effectively used. The following are the examples of the probems we found.   

Fig. 1  Cases where poor communications among students resulting in poor usages

 

We see here that the system installed based on the students’ opinns is not functioning properly as it was installed without accurately grasping the students’ needs as in Case1, or that the good intention is not materialized because of the lack of the necessary system although the university wants to fill the students’ needs as in Case 2. In order to fix these problems, it is necessary to construct a method of incorporating the students’ opinions more efficiently. Mismatch between the university and the students can be avoided to collect more specific opinions; for example, not just to hear the opinion “XX thing is needed” but rather where and in what form it has to be provided. In addition, it is important for the university to be able to collect and accumulate opinions of the students more easily and timely. 

Next, we will compare the current Student Census with Student Census 2008. In Student Census 2008, we focused on two points, “information delivery from the university” and “incorporation of information from students,” and we proposed an improvement plan for the information delivery from the university. In contrast to that, we focused on the incorporation of infromation from students in the current survey.

·Elimination of confusion due to the inquiry service

In this proposal, an idea was proposed to converge all the inquiry portals into one central portal so that it would be easy for the students to inquire. In response to this proposal, the Q&A List is now open on the university’s web page for everyone to see, but the centralization of the inquiry portals has not occurred yet. During the current Student Census, we asked the administration department if Kyomu-ka and individual faculty departments can have an integraqted portal and we were told it is difficult to do so for the time being. (Please refer to our recommendation concerning this issue on Page 13.)  

·Incorporation of students’ opinions with the help of student supporters

We now have a variety of student support programs related to various services and facilities of the university including library supporters, peer supporters, foreign student tutors, energy saving supporters, and Student Sensus staff members as listed on Table 1.

 

Table 1  List of Supporters and Outline of Their Duties

Supporters

Duties

Departments

Peer Supporter

Provides advice for freshmen and juniors on academic and career issues, and daily life

Student Services Ctr

Library Supporter

Some of librarian’s duties (arranging books on shelves, public relation works, planning, study consultations and reception for visitors)

Library

International Student Tutor

Provides tutoring on study and research and general guidance to international students new on the camps  

Student Services Ctr

Energy Saving Supporter

Go around the campus to see if there are any wasteful energy uses of power in lighting, HVAC, and cleaning and turn off wasteful power supplies

Facilities Dept

Student Census Staff Member

Prepare questionnairs for Student Census, conduct analysis, and make recommendations

Student Services GP

 

As you can see, areas in which the students can support the operation of the university are increasing and the university is trying to incorporate students’ viewpoints in the management. However, the supporters’ roles in many cases are still nlot much beyond simple part-time jobs and “incorporation of students’ opinioins” is yet a target in distance. On the other hand, these activities can contribute in accumulating know-how and clearly defining role-sharing as they are continued and eventually may bring important changes in the system, so that we should have a long range view in evaluating them. 

 

·Mechanism of students’ feedback to the university

Although a recommedation was made as a result of the Student Census 2008 to establish a mechanism to continuously monitor and collect students’ opinoins but it has not been materialized.

 

Thefore, we have to conclude that “incorporation of students’ opinons” has yet to be achieved. However, it seems that we need to be patient with some of those supporter jobs as they may take some time to materialize or show effects. 


 

Specific Recommendations

In order to solve the problems shown above, the following two points are the keys.

(1)     Students participate in grasping the students’ needs and designing of the system

(2)   Continuity   

 

(1)   Students participate in grasping the students’ needs and designing of the system

For the moment, studnets’ opinions and requests are collected and analyzed by the university to design and implement its policies as shown below. Under the current system, however, not much considerations are given to the students’ real needs and ease of use of the implemented solutions, so that the solutions are not fulfilling the true needs of the students. We believe that opinions based on students’ viewpoints should be integraqted into the design of the solutions so that more effective solutions can be achieved. The conclusions of Student Census should be a part of it, and be included in more specific stages.

 

 ,Analyase student opinion ,Design solution based on opinion,Opinion A,Solution A,Opinion A AA,Opinion B,Opinion C,Opinion A,Opinion B,Opinion C

,Opinion C

,Opinion A,Opinion A,Collectstudent opinon
Student,University,Student,University

Fig. 2 Image Diagram for Solution Implementation Diagram

(2) Continuity

Since Student Census is done every other year, it is difficult to collect students’ opinions timely or to feed back students’ opinions as to whether or not the solutions provided by the university based on the  recommendations match students’ needs. We believe a system for continuously collecting students’ opinions can solve the aforementioned problems, and the university can store those opinions as database for future use as well.   

Based on the above concept, we wish to propose the following:

 

·Preliminary Survey and Presentation

We will disclose the information on a facility being planned by the univesity on the Web and conduct a survey to solicit opinions of students asking them to submit within a certain period (e.g., 2 weeks). This will serve not only as a conduit to let the students know about the facility installation plan but also to solicit the [students’] opinons so that we can make sure that the new facility matches with their true needs, or improve the plan. (The reason that we are using the square brackets as [students] is because there is a time lag between the students who provide opinions and the students who will actually benefits from the new facilities. The timelag is inevitable particularly in case of a long range plan, but we see that it is still necessary for us to solicity opinions from students.)

Once the project is kicked off, we will have a presentation meeting in order to let the people who will be actually using the facility fully understand the reason for the implementation, the merits, and the method of use. This should minimize the risk of complaints of the users to be caused after the facility is completed and also give us a chance to improve the operation of the facility.        

説明: C:\Documents\その他\ちょーさ2010\ミーティング資料\Buildings.dwg.emf,Building reconstrution
Information,University,Target students,Questionnaire,Presentation
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Fig. 3 Image Diagram for Preliminary Survey & Presentation

·Student Monitor

We will select a group of student monitors who are to be registered. When the university wishes to install something new or correct a problem, the university can always check their opinions for references.  

More specifically, we will recruit student monitors and prepare a special mailing list of them. Whenever the university wishes to check students’ responses, the university can conduct a survey or send invitations to the monitors for an opinion exchange meeting. Another possibility is to have a monthly occasion of getting-together to check their opinions periodically. a

 While this method provides a meas of quickly and securely check the opinions of studtents ever for minor subjects, it has shortcomings that the opinions will always be confined to those of a relatively small group of students, so that its use may have to be limited. 

 

Fig. 4  Image Diagram of Student Monitors


 

·Opinion Exchange Portal

This is to install a bulletineboard system on the Internet on which students can submit opinions and requests to allow everyone to watch the tendency of opinions and the responses of the university. More specifically, the system will allow students to submit opinions and question, various departments of the university to respond to them, and other students to submits further responses as shown in Fig. 5. By providing “Aye” and “Nay” buttons to each opinion, attentions of other students can be measured. 

We believe that the use of such a system to collect opinions from students and feed back the opinions to the policy of the uinversity may allow the policies to be developed closer to the students’ views. Even if the university cannot meet the students’ request, it can still minimize the mismatch between the university and the students by explaining the reason why.

In implementing such a system, we believe that it would require to prevent vandalisms and destructive actions by causing it to require to log in through TokyoTech’s portal, or enable to post using handlenames, or the uniersity to check the contents of posts.

Student A: Time limit of XX Department’s Refresh Room is too short., I often use XX Department’s Refresh Room for writing reports, but the problem is that it closes at 17:00. Could it be extended to at least until 19:00? I would appreciate very much if you could do so.,Nay(1),Aye(1),XX Department’s staff member YY, This is YY who operates XX Department’s Refresh Room.
 XX Department’s Refresh Room used to be open 24 hours at one point but we decided to shorten the hours because users’ manners were pretty bad and the room was littered with trash.
 It is difficult for us to extend the hours at this point.
,Nay(0),Aye(1),Student B, I understand that you had to shorten the hours because of bad manners but I wonder if we can have a person appointed for each weekday among the frequent users and make him/her to be responsible for keeping the room litterless. Please reconsider.,Nay(0),Aye(5),※This is a fictious case and has no relevence with any actual case.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Fig. 5  Image Diagram for Opinion Exchange Portal


 

Each of these specific plans has its own characteristics so that a combination of them will make it possible to achieve policies that match with students’ viewpoints.  

For example, when the university decides to create a new building, it would be effective to have a preliminary survey and a presentation as the students who will be affected can be well defined. If a fair is to be held for the promotion of students to study overseas, it may be a good idea to consult with student monitors in advance to achieve a more efficient public relation activities. On the other hand, it may be difficult for the uniersity to survey the complaints concerning the exisiting facilties such as Refresh Room so that we believe that it may be better for the university to plan a policy based on the opinions submitted to the opinion exchange portal or to let the policy known to the students.

Fig. 6  Characteristics of Each Specific Plan

 

We blieve that the existing problemts can be solved by these recommendations. However, the key is that praticiparions of students paricipate to designing of these systems in order to achieve result satisfactory tor both the uniersity and the students. Moreover, even after the systems are installed, it is important to continue to endeavour to let the students know about how these systems work.


 

4        Outline of of Recommendations on Specific Items

Recommendation Item

Outline

Service Related Items

1 Unification of administrative procedures and information transmission

1.1 On unification of administrative procedures and information transmission

As a policy of unification of administrative process office and means of information transmission, we propose:  

1)If unification of administrative office is difficult, at least make an effort to let students know better which office is responsible for which matters 

2)Use electronic means as much as possible for information transmission in order to deliver it to persons who need it securely

1.2 Unification of lost and found service

Please establish a single source for the lost and found service.

2 Course Registration Web·OCW

2.1 Course Registration Web

Enrichment of the functions of Course Registration Web system

2.2 OCW-i

We wish faculty members to use OCW-I more actively.

3 Job hunting activities

3.1 Job hunting support in general

Enrichment of job finding support (particularly for undergraduates and those who wish to have non-engineering jobs)

3.2 On selections of seminar days

Seminars on job hunting/career should be held on wider varieties of weekdays

3.3 Opportunities of contacts with OBs/OGs

Enhance the contacts between the university and Kuramae Kogyokai to help students seek better professional careers

4 Study-abroad programs, international students

4.1 Study-abroad programs

·Enhancement and unification of information concerning intra- university and departmental agreements on study-abroad programs

·Expansion of frameworks of study-abroad programs, particularly those of popular ones, and improvements of conditions

4.2 Interactions with international students  

Promotion of interactions with international students through refurbishing and improvements of W1 building

4.3 Economical support for international support

It is necessary to alleviate complaints among international students for insufficient financial support to them.

5 Financial support

5.1 Scholarship, tuition

Scholarship and tuition-free privilege should be awarded to those who are in more needs by improved public relation activities.  

5.2 TA/RA

Clarification/unification of TA/RA’s “work hour” standard

6 Student circles

6.1 Improvement of circle support

Provide a venue for contacts with various circles 

6.2 Fair and open rule for the use of facilities by student circles

Review the existing usage rule through discussions among circles to make it suitable for the needs

6.3 Student circle building

Clean and refurbish existing building or renew it.

7 Attitude of administrative clerks

7.1 Attitude of administrative clerks

Further improvement in the attitudes of administrative clerks in meeting with students is desired.

Facilities

1 Space for resting (place for safely taking naps)

1.1 Installation of a space for resting (place for safely taking naps)

Some students need to continue research overnight depending on their themes. We recommend a place for resting safely for those students.

1.2 Improvement of shower rooms

Install shower rooms and make it known how to use them.

2 Refresh Room

2.1 Extension of refresh room usage hours

Extension of refresh room usage hours

2.2 Review of refresh room management

Review of refresh room management

2.3 Increase of open space

Increase of open space with no restriction of user qualification

3 Student dormitory

3.1 Needs of improving student dormitory

The number of international students is rising steeply causing a shortage of dormitory space. Dormitory Improvement Committee was created last year as a university-wide organization to secure more dormitory space.

4 Smoking

4.1 Poor smoking area assignment

Assignment of smoking areas needs improvement

4.2 Bad smoking manner

Stricter enforcement of smoking manner dos and don’ts is desired.

5 Bicycle parking

5.1 Enforcement of bicycling rules

Stricter enforcement of bicycling rules is desired.

6 Trash bins

6.1 Trash collection on weekends

Review of trash collection on weekends is recommended.

7 O-okayama sports facilities

7.1 Training room at gymnasium

Refurbishing/renewal of worn-out equipment such as bench press

Extension of training room usage hours on weekdays

7.2 Gymnasium arena

Installation of HVAC or repair of ventilation device

7.3 Tennis court

Provision of tennis court rental hours to outside users

8 Suzukakedai sports facilities

8.1 Field

Increase the types of sports that can be played on the field

8.2 Futsal court

New installation or refurbishing of futsal court

8.3 Gymnasium and pool

New installation of gymnasium and pool, or consideration of existing facilities for sports use

8.4 Training Center

Extension of usage hours

9 Musholla

9.1 Improvement of Musholla

It is recommended to check the utilization level of Musholla and to acquire a place newly if necessary.

10 Wireless LAN

10.1 Improvement of wireless LAN

It is recommended to listen to the voices of students on wireless LAN as to the locations of the access points of warless LAN.

11 On security and safety

11.1 On security and safety

Recommend safety management incorporating students’ opinions

12 S-5 Building

12.1 On reconstruction of S-5 Building

Recommend that the progress of the reconstruction project of S-5 Building be reported regularly.

13 Personal lockers

13.1 Personal lockers

Recommend listening to the students’ requests and checking the actual status of personal lockers in planning the improvement plan.

14 7-Eleven Store

14.1 7-Eleven Store

Please extend the store hours of 7-Eleven as much as possible.

15 Lecture halls

15.1 Unpopular lecture halls

Please improve the conditions of lecture halls unpopular among students.

Academic Items

1 University’s policy

1.1 Discussion on the university’s policy

Recommend to establish a place of discussions between the university and the students on the policy to aim for.

1.2 Improvement of students’ attitudes toward, consciousness of, width of, and tolerance for varieties of views on studies

We believe that enrichment of curriculum and format of class encouraging students’ initiative and consciousness of issues will be effective for improving students’ attitudes toward, consciousness of, width of, and tolerance for varieties of views on studies

1.3 Inventiveness in lecture style in order to improve undergraduate students’ objective consciousness

Inventiveness in lecture style in order to improve undergraduate students’ objective consciousness is recommended

2 International education

2.1 Linguistic capability of students

Encouragement of communications with international students of the university

2.2 Enhancement of English language capability of faculty 

Enhancement of English language capability of faculty

2.3 Enrichment of linguistic class at Suzukakedai Campus

Reconsideration of class room format and curriculums considering students at Suzukakedai Campus

3 Research and laboratories

3.1 Support for student in research

Disclosure of information aimed for improving mutual understanding on research environment   

3.2 Binding hour of laboratory

Binding hour of laboratory is too long

3.3 Compatibility of research and education in graduate school

Realization of policy for seeking compatibility of research and education in graduate school

3.4 Exchange of information between laboratories

Encouragement of information exchange on open seminars

4 Actual state of classroom

4.1 Class evaluation survey

Status report based on class evaluation survey

4.2 Status report on teaching staff

Status report of opinions concerning teaching staff

4.3 Status report on class attendance and attendance credit

Complaints against attendance credit system and obligation to attend class

4.4 Consideration toward working students

Enrichment of consideration for working students

5 University system

5.1 Information exchange with other universities

Promotion of information exchange with other universities

6 Curriculum

6.1 Class schedule and contents

More active voicing of student opinions desired

6.2 Request for non-engineering classes

Enrichment of non-engineering classes desired

7 Credits/grades

Standardization of disclosure method of grading system

Harassment

1 Actual status of harassment

Actual state of harassment should be reported

2 Prevention of harassment

Enhancement of harassment prevention measures is recommended

Library

1 Library hours

1.1 Library hours

Recommend extension of library hours depending on the fluctuation of the number of users and manners of users. 

2 Suzukakedai Library

2.1 Suzukakedai Library

Recommend to place importance to the approach to the library in the future Suzukakedai campus planning

3 OPAC and Web

3.1 Improvement of accuracy and functionality of OPAC (Online Public Access Catalog)

Strongly request that a system incorporating students’ opinions be implemented at the system update scheduled for January 2013

3.2 Improvement of web page design

Strongly request that a web page incorporating students’ opinions be implemented at the system update scheduled for January 2013.

4 Enrichment of collection

4.1 Enrichment of non-engineering book collection

Enrichment of non-engineering book collection

4.2 Request of enrichment of collection of other kinds

Fluctuation was noted in the opinions among respondents as to the kinds of materials to be collected

Co-op

1 Box lunch and restaurants

1.1 Food prices of restaurants

We believe no particular problems are noted.

1.2 Food tastes of restaurants

We believe no particular problems are noted.

1.3 Requests of international students

·Please try to enrich halal menu.

·Please try to develop menu which is easier for international student to choose from.

1.4 Health-oriented menu and high volume-menu

Please try to enrich menu on both health-oriented and high volume-oriented menu.

1.5 Specific menu

No specific request was noted.

2 Facilities

2.1 Congestion at restaurants

Continued effort to mitigate congestion will be appreciated.

2.2 Operating hours

We believe that changes of hours are difficult.

2.3 Construction of new restaurants in Ishikawadai and Midorigaoka

We believe that they are difficult to be materialized.

 

 


2010 Tokyo Institute of Technology