How College Affects Students : Findings and Insights from Twenty Years of Research /

Bibliogr.: p. 693-847Index: p. 849-89

More than Meets the Eye: Curricular and Programmatic Effects on Student Learning

This article reports the effects of program characteristics and faculty activities on students’ experiences and, ultimately, the development of students’ analytical and group skills. Data come from nationally representative samples of 4,330 seniors, 1,243 faculty members, and 147 engineering program chairs on 40 campuses nationwide. Findings indicate that program characteristics and faculty behaviors and values have significant, if relatively small and largely indirect, effects on student learning by encouraging (or discouraging) certain kinds of student experiences, which, in turn, influence student learning. The results point to a need for more complex designs than are typically adopted in most learning outcomes studies