At the DUT Data awards ceremony which were made during the annual RIE Research awards ceremony in December, last year, staff were awarded for their outstanding data presentations focusing on DUT’s ENVISION2030 for each of its core perspectives namely; Stewardship, Systems and Processes, Sustainability and Society.
In recognition of the best presentation in the perspective of Stewardship, the award was handed to Dr Koo Parker for the Student Feedback from the First Year Student Survey (FYSS) which is an initiative of the Siyaphumelela Project.
Sharing her thoughts on winning for her presentation on Stewardship, Dr Parker said she was honoured that the Adjudicating Committee awarded her Best Presentation for the Stewardship perspective.
“I was thrilled to accept the award on behalf of the Planning Office and the many colleagues across the university who helped with the administration of the First Year Student Survey (FYSS) on which my presentation was based,” she said elatedly.
Dr Parker shared more on her presentation and what it entailed, saying that it highlighted the stewardship role of the Siyaphumelela Project in building a data culture at DUT and using data to inform policies and processes at the university.
“The Project aims to improve student success and the student experience, and more particularly, increase throughput rates of undergraduate students. Data were presented from the 2019 and 2020 First-year Student Survey (FYSS). This is a new survey that we developed to collect feedback on students’ support needs and their experiences with certain departments/activities with which they would have engaged during the registration process,” she said.
She further indicated that these departments include Recruitment, Registration, Cashiers and Orientation.
“The two-year comparison indicated that students’ experiences have improved. More than 60% of students in both 2019 and 2020 reported having a good or very good experience in their engagements with these departments. Recruitment showed the biggest improvement, but it is clear that there are still problems being experienced during registration. Students recommended that staff show greater patience and understanding, and that better registration facilities including computers were needed to improve the registration experience,” she said.
Dr Parker stressed that given the shift to online registration this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they are reviewing the FYSS accordingly. She said that the Planning Office aims to enhance stewardship by continuing its institutional research work and building collaborations with other DUT departments to provide useful trend data for policy improvement purposes.
Dr Parker also highlighted what is forthcoming in terms of projects that she is working on for this year.
“A major project being co-ordinated through the Planning Office is the establishment of baseline data, measures and targets for ENVISION2030’s key performance indicators. We will definitely continue with DUT Data Day, which again will be a virtual event,” she said.
Other projects that Dr Parker is leading include DUT’s participation in the Siyaphumelela engagement surveys, and the U-Multirank international benchmarking survey.
Pictured: Dr Koo Parker
Waheeda Peters
