Measuring Master's Student Engagement

• Main Author: O'Dair, Katherine Grace
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Boston College 2012
• Subjects: Engagement; Master's; Student; Survey
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2345/2924

Thesis advisor: Karen D. Arnold === Master's education is the largest segment of graduate education in the United States yet there is a paucity of research about how master's students experience their programs. Empirical research on student engagement - defined as the time and effort students devote to activities that are linked to educational outcomes and what institutions do to promote student participation in these activities - is discussed in the literature as a mostly undergraduate phenomenon (Kuh, 2001; 2003; Kuh et al., 2007a). This quantitative study extended engagement research to master's students using an instrument called the Master's Survey of Student Engagement (MSSE), which was adapted from the Law School Survey of Student Engagement. The MSSE was administered to 1,539 students enrolled in a master's program in arts and sciences, business, or education at a mid-sized research University in the Northeast. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted to examine the internal structure of the MSSE. Following the factor analysis, five multiple regression analyses were conducted; each multiple regression analysis examined the relationship between a particular engagement dimension (as the dependent variable) and the student characteristics of academic discipline, gender, age, enrollment status, children status, marital status, and international status (as the independent variables). While the findings suggest at least five dimensions of engagement for master's students, three of these dimensions are more strongly associated with student characteristics, including academic discipline. The findings also showed that master's students in business and education are more likely to experience a supportive campus environment than are students in arts and sciences. The findings also suggested that arts and sciences students have a more rigorous intellectual experience and engage more with faculty than do students in education or business. === Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2012. === Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. === Discipline: Educational Leadership and Higher Education.