Feedback

Everything you need to know about collecting and writing up feedback, and reminders of where to report both academic and non-academic feedback items.

Jump to:
Collecting feedback
Writing feedback
Reporting feedback
Closing the feedback loop

Collecting Feedback

Collecting feedback from fellow students to present to staff is key to your role as a rep. It's best to try a variety of methods for collecting feedback to reach as many students on your course as possible - here you can find some inspiration on the types of feedback you might collect and methods you can use to collect feedback from students.

Quantitative vs. Qualitative Feedback

Quantitative feedback - Numbers-based feedback that helps to demonstrate that the opinions you are sharing are held by a large majority. You will gather this feedback by asking closed questions, which are questions that just require a one-word response, e.g. ‘yes or no’, ‘agree/disagree/neither agree nor disagree’.

Qualitative feedback - Words-based feedback that helps to illustrate what the specific issue is that students are having, how it’s impacting them, and how they might like it to be resolved. This feedback is gathered through open questions, which allow the person responding to provide a lot more detail about how they feel/think about a subject.

Phrasing Questions

When collecting feedback, avoid asking leading questions. These are questions are suggestive of a particular desired answer. E.g., Instead of asking, “how much did you enjoy your course rep training?” you should ask, “how did you find your course rep training?”. If you ask leading questions, you may give students the impression that they're supposed to be positive or negative about an issue, rather than allowing them to share what they really think.

Avoiding asking leading questions does not mean you can't be specific in the feedback you collect. For instance, if you have overheard some students complaining about their sessions being timetabled too close together, you could ask your wider cohort about this issue to see if they share the same view. When you do so, make sure the question is neutral; ask 'how are you finding the timetabling of the course' rather than 'do you think your sessions are too close together', for instance.

Methods to Collect Feedback

Group chats: You may have course group chats created already, and you can also make these easily on MS Teams using your university account.

Shout-outs in lectures: Ask your lecturer for 5 minutes before/after a lecture to collect feedback. This is a great way to get quantitative feedback through a show of hands.

Online surveys: These are useful as they allow students to share both quantitative and qualitative feedback with you in their own time, outside of lectures and seminars. They may also allow students to submit feedback anonymously. You have access to Microsoft Forms as part of your university account, and can also use other platforms such as google forms or surveymonkey.

Noticeboards: Your departments may have physical notice boards, which you can ask to post on! You could post a QR code to an online survey, or even leave a piece of paper and pen for students to physically write feedback on. Just be mindful that people who aren't in your course year group may also use these noticeboard spaces.

Catch-ups/drop-ins: You can always have drop-in sessions with people on your course - you could host these online, or find a space on campus for students to come and meet with you. Try hosting a drop-in after a lecture or seminar to get the most out of your cohort's time on campus!

Email: You could send emails asking for feedback to your year group via your university email address. If your course cohort is quite big, you may wish to ask staff to send a message out on your behalf and include your email for students to get in touch with you.

Writing Up Feedback to Staff

Once you have collected feedback from students, you will need to organise it and write it up in the appropriate format for the meeting you are submitting it to. Before submitting feedback to a Falmouth SSLG/Exeter SSLC, you should check that it meets the ABCDEs checklist below. You may also want to look at how to share feedback with staff to make sure your feedback is well-recieved!

Writing up Feedback: the ABCDEs Checklist

You can use the ABCDEs checklist to make sure your feedback is correctly representative of students in your cohort. before writing up and submitting your feedback, be sure to check:

Is the feedback Accurate & Appropriate?
It is important that the feedback you share is accurate to what you were given from students and is appropriate to share in the space. If the feedback does not relate to your course or academic experience, it may not be appropriate for a Falmouth SSLG meeting or Exeter SSLC meeting. You can find out more about the difference between academic and non-academic feedback and where you should report feedback below.
Is the feedback Balanced?
Seek to understand the experiences of students from different backgrounds and try different approaches to enable all students to feel comfortable in sharing their views about the course. Do not submit feedback to an SSLG/SSLC that is only representative of your personal opinion, you must make sure you have done your research and checked that an issue is impacting multiple students before sharing it at this forum.
Is the feedback Constructive?
Seek to understand what is working well alongside what could be improved. Where possible, offer suggestions to how an issue could be improved; if students have also shared these ideas with you, that's even better!
Is the feedback De-Personalised?
Avoid naming individual students or staff. You separate feedback from individuals and their behaviour where possible. For instance, if students tell you that Dr Smith's lectures are very hard to understand and they are struggling to engage with them, you could reframe this as 'some students find the lectures on [module title] very hard to understand'.

However, if the feedback is inseperable from the individual and their behaviour, such as students telling you that Dr Smith has repeatedly turned up to lectures late and refused to answer any students questions, you should report this to the next appropriate member of staff, usually your course or programme leader. Do not bring this type of feedback to an SSLG/SSLC, as it cannot be reported without naming the individual and the meeting minutes are publicly shared with other students and staff.
Is the feedback evidenced?
Prove that the feedback you have received is true through supporting statistics and/or student comments. You can also be open about the methods you used to collect feedback. For example, '25 out of 30 students anonymously surveyed said that...', 'a focus group we conducted with 9 students demonstrated that...'.

Writing up Feedback: How to Share Feedback with Staff

If you feel a little nervous about raising feedback to staff because you aren't sure how well they will take the feedback, you can use the tips below to phrase your feedback so that it is well recieved by staff.

Be Timely
It helps to be timely with reporting feedback as this ensures that your lecturers and staff teams have plenty of time to review and resolve an issue. When sharing feedback to SSLGs/SSLCs, submitting feedback well in advance of the meetings supports your Department Rep (Falmouth) or Subject Chair (Exeter) to arrange a meeting agenda in a timely manner, which also gives staff more time to consider any actions that may need to happen in response to your feedback.

If you have feedback that you'd like to raise in an SSLG/SSLC that you did not submit in advance, do not try to force it into the agenda. Instead ask if you can raise further feedback if there is time at the end of the meeting.
Be Specific and Concise
What needs to be improved and why? The clearer the details you provide in your feedback, the better an understanding you will give to staff, which helps to avoid miscommunication. Try to also be concise when writing up feedback; limit yourself to 150-200 words per feedback point so that staff can quickly grasp the issue and aren't overwhelmed with lots of information at once.
Be Polite and Respectful
Rather than saying issues need 'fixing' or 'correcting', try using words like 'enhance' or 'improve'. Always avoid using emotive language such as 'students hate this lecture'. Try to keep your feedback neutral and phrase the issue without pointing fingers or assigning blame; rather than saying 'you aren't explaining our assessment very well', you could say 'students would benefit from more clarity on their upcoming assessments'.
Be Solutions-Focused and Offer Suggestions
Try to keep the conversation moving towards finding a solution to your issue - you may have solutions in mind that could help, or students may have suggested ideas that you could share.

You don't always have to offer a solution to an issue, as there may be some issues that are too complex for you to solve. In this case, you can show your appreciation for your lecturer's efforts and offer your support if they need it, through phrases such as 'thank you for taking the time to consider this issue', or 'if there's any way I can help, please let me know'.
Give Positive Feedback and New Ideas as well as Complaints!
Not all of the feedback you collect has to be negative - you can collect positive feedback too!

Positive feedback can help reinforce to staff what is working on your course, and encourage them to keep doing these things. Staff may stop delivering workshops, lectures, etc. if students don't share how much these things are valued!

You and students on your course are also welcome to suggest new ideas for your course. For instance, if students on your course would like to have a department social to get to know their lecturers better - suggest it! New ideas demonstrate to staff that you are invested in improving the course and would like to work with them, rather than expecting them to do all the work.

Where Should I Report Feedback?

As a rep, your primary job is to collect academic feedback to take to your course team at SSLGs/SSLCs. However, you may also still receive feedback on non-academic issues that are impacting your cohort. Below is a list of feedback items appropriate for an SSLG/SSLC and a flowchart to help you check where you should be reporting the feedback you before you submit it.

Examples of Academic Feedback

The SSLG/SSLC meetings you attend with academic staff are intended to discuss any feedback students have about their course, subject area or academic department. The following topics are examples of typical feedback you might take to Falmouth SSLGs/Exeter SSLCs:

Teaching, e.g. course/module content
Timetabling issues and concerns
Learning resources, e.g. library, stores, IT resources
Assessment and feedback
Personal tutoring
Student-led projects and events
The overall effectiveness of Falmouth SSLGs/Exeter SSLCs and the actions of the department and The SU in response to it

Examples of Non-Academic Feedback

Any feedback you collect from your course cohort that relates to non-academic topics impacting your wider student experience such as accommodation, parking on campus, campus maintenance, non-academic events on campus, etc. isn’t effective to bring to meetings with academic staff as they usually aren’t able to respond directly to the problem. There are various ways you can address non-academic feedback outside of SSLG/SSLCs:

Make a Change - If you have an idea or campaign about how to change things for the wider student community, you can submit it on our make a change platform for other students to vote on.

Sabbatical Officers - Alternatively, if you have a pressing issue impacting the student community that you're not sure how to resolve, you can get in touch with your Sabbatical Officer team. If you'd like to contact one of your sabbatical officers, simply send them an email!

Have you checked our signposting page? It may be that your feedback can be directly reported to the team it relates to. You can report feedback about maintenace issues on campus or feedback about your library services directly to the relevant teams. Find out more on our signposting page.

You can use the flowchart below to check that you are taking feedback to the right place:

Supporting Individual Student Complaints

Please note that as a representative, you should only be reporting feedback that impacts a significant number of sudents on your course. If the feedback being raised to you is only impacting an idividual or small group of students, such as an academic appeal or a housing contract complication, you can support these students by signposting them to the appropriate support services - check out our signposting page for more information on how to support students with personal problems

Closing the Feedback Loop

It is incredibly important that after every meeting you let your course mates know:

What feedback you brought to be discussed in the meeting.
How staff intend to respond to this feedback; what actions were agreed, and when will students see the results of these actions?

You can do this in the same way you may have gathered feedback, for instance;

Ask to speak about SSLG/SSLC feedback at the start or end of a lecture, seminar or course meeting.
Share the feedback to students' university emails - you could potentially get an update added to your department newsletter if they have one.
Send a quick update to your course group chat.
Post any updates on noticeboards in your department.

Closing the feedback loop is a requirement of your role as a Representative. If students don’t know how staff intend to make changes, they can’t hold staff accountable for those changes!

Need More Help?

If you're in need of further support with collecting, writing up or reporting feedback, get in touch with us at StudentVoice@thesu.org.uk.