Our surveys
The start of your journey
Your findings will help you to make better informed decisions about the digital environment and to target resources where they are most needed.
Our surveys will help you to engage all users in shaping the digital experience and environment you offer. They are an invaluable way of informing and driving change for your organisation, providing data that contributes to digital strategy and quality enhancement. Use the surveys to inform digital developments, demonstrate return on investment and to measure and evidence change as initiatives evolve.
Framing the bigger picture
The anonymised data collected by service users allows us to gain a national picture of student and staff digital experiences and to monitor this over time, showing progress and highlighting issues of national concern. This evidence-based research enables us to respond promptly to sector needs.
Four key themes
Our question sets have been carefully researched in consultation with students and staff and each survey is tailored to a specific target audience and help you to explore four key aspects of their digital experience:
- You and your technology
- Technology in your organisation
- Technology in your learning/role
- Developing your digital skills
Find out more about how the surveys work and key dates for the 2023/24 insights surveys.
For 2023/24 we offer the following surveys:
Student/learner survey (opens 16 October 2023 - closes 26 April 2024)
This survey enables organisations to collect and analyse data from students and learners about how they feel about key aspects of the digital environment provided and how technology is used to support their learning.
We offer two different versions of the student/learner digital experience insights survey:
- FE learners
- HE students
Teaching staff survey (opens 16 October 2023 - closes 28 June 2024)
This survey enables organisations to collect and analyse data from teaching staff, gathering their experiences and expectations of the digital environment and how this influences practices in teaching, learning and assessment.
We offer two different versions of the teaching staff digital experience insights survey
- FE teaching staff
- HE teaching staff
Professional services staff survey (opens 16 October 2023 - closes 21 June 2024)
The professional services staff survey is important in ensuring that the views of those who support the wider aspects of the organisation are considered as they make a vital contribution towards shaping the digital environment and consequently the broader user experience. The survey is the same for FE and HE professional services staff although we report separately for each sector.
International university insights (opens 16 October 2023)
A growing number of international organisations are also using our surveys. Information specific to international organisations includes:
- All our surveys are available to international organisations but some things like close dates can be varied to reflect different academic cycles. See key dates for our surveys
- Surveys can be launched at any time from sign-up. You are free to choose the time that suits your organisation best. Typically institutions allow a three week period for participants to respond
- Some of the survey questions lend themselves to benchmarking against other comparable organisations. Providing there are enough organisations with enough data to make valid comparisons. You will have access to comparative data from the most relevant benchmarking group
- Where we have sufficient numbers of comparable organisations participating from a country, we will also offer a summary report of the anonymised data. For example, see our report on 2018 insights student survey findings for Australia and New Zealand
- We are able to provide translation of the survey questions into a number of other languages. You will be asked about your requirements when you sign up. We are not currently able to translate any of the guidance materials
You may have access to other support from Jisc, depending on how many organisations sign up from your country and/or area. We actively encourage you to get others involved, through your own networks and contacts.
What our digital experience insights service includes:
- Surveys for students, teaching staff and professional services staff
- The option to run the surveys annually or as pulse surveys (enables you to run surveys more than once in an academic year)
- The option to add a few of your own local questions at the end of your survey
- Real-time access to your own responses
- Results templates to help you summarise and share your findings with management teams, students and staff
- Sector benchmarking data
- Annual reports that highlight national issues
- Proactive support from Jisc and the wider community of practice
- Welsh translations of each version
360 degree insights - gain a richer perspective
The surveys can be used independently but running our student and staff surveys concurrently will give you a more rounded picture of your organisation’s digital practices and provision and will help you to:
- Accurately monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of your digital strategy and investments
- Validate your data and identify key areas for development
- Map findings across your surveys and use the data alongside other organisational data to drive improvements and inform strategy