UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY ACADEMIC CALENDAR SURVEY
The survey took place in the spring of 2014, responses were collected between 3/18/04 and 3/27/04. A bulk of the responses were collected in the first 48 hours (83%).
There were 12 questions, some were shown only to certain groups.
1. Please indicate if you are an undergraduate student, graduate students, faculty member, or staff person. Responses: undergraduate student, graduate students, faculty member, staff person.
1.1 For faculty members: If you taught classes this past fall semester (2013), how many of your scheduled-courses did you hold on Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving Week? Response: None, some, all, not applicable.
1.2 For faculty members: if you are teaching classes this spring semester (2014, Monday classes were held on a Tuesday (February, 18th). This year, how many of your classes regularly held on Mondays, did you hold on Tuesday (February, 18th). Response: None, some, all, not applicable.
1.3 For students: I have taken the majority of my classes at (choose the nearest USU loca-tion). Responses: Logan, Salt Lake, Brigham City, Ephraim, Tooele, Southwest Region, Uintah Basin, USU Eastern (Price/San Juan), Moab, Out of Utah but in USA, Kaysville, International Sites, Orem
1.4 For students: This past fall semester (2013), on Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving Week...how many of your classes were held? Response: None, Some, All, Not applicable 1.5 For students: This past fall semester (2013), on Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving
Week for classes that were held...how many did you attend? Response: None, Some, All, Not applicable
1.6 For students: This spring semester (2014), for Monday classes that were held on a Tuesday (February 18th)...how many of your classes were held? Response: None, Some, All, Not applicable
1.7 For students: This spring semester (2014), for Monday classes that were held on a Tuesday (February 18th)...for classes that were held, how many did you attend? Re-sponse: None, Some, All, Not applicable
2. Below is a list of statements related to the FALL academic calendar. Drag each calendar "statement" into the box that most closely aligns with your opinion. Options: I strongly agree, I am neutral, I strongly disagree. Statements:
2.2 The start of the fall semester is too late. 2.3 The fall break (mid-October) is too early. 2.4 The fall break (mid-October) is too late.
2.5 The "Friday classes held on Thursday" schedule for fall break is disruptive. 2.6 The length of fall break (currently one day) is too short.
2.7 The length of Thanksgiving Break (currently three days) is too short. 2.8 The end of the fall semester (too early)
2.9 The end of the fall semester (too late) 2.10 Other issue (please identify)
3. Below is a list of statements related to the FALL academic calendar. Drag each calendar "statement" into the box that most closely aligns with your opinion. Options: I strongly agree, I am neutral, I strongly disagree.
3.1 The start of the spring semester is too early. 3.2 The start of the spring semester is too late. 3.3 Spring break is too early.
3.4 Spring break is too late.
3.5 The end of the spring term is too early. 3.6 The end of the spring term is too late.
3.7 The "Monday classes held on Tuesday" schedule is disruptive. 3.8 Other issue (please identify)
4. If you could make one change to USU's academic calendar, what would it be? Response: open ended.
5. Please include any comments that you would like the calendar committee to consider. Re-sponse: open ended.
The sample was predominately undergraduate students (n=2075) and these students were pre-dominately from Logan Campus (87.5%).
There were 511 responses from faculty and 674 responses from staff.
KEY FINDINGS FALL START/END
* Students, staff, and faculty were neutral on the timing of the start of fall term and the end of fall term.
FALL BREAK
* Students, staff, and faculty were neutral on the timing of fall break. However, a majority of all three groups indicated strong agreement with the statement "The length of fall break (currently one day) is too short."
* Regarding "Friday classes held on Thursday" for fall break, 54% of students, 48% of facul-ty and 41% of staff indicated strong agreement with the statement that the schedule change was "disruptive." Very few (12%, 14%, and 10%, respectively) strongly disagreed.
THANKSGIVING BREAK
* Among faculty who reported teaching in the fall, 69% reported teaching all of their regu-larly scheduled courses during Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving week. Nearly one in five (17%) reported holding none of their courses during these days.
* Among students, 44% indicated that "all" of their classes were held on monday and tues-day. Nearly two-thirds of students reported attending "All" of the classes that were held. * In terms of the length of Thanksgiving Break, 45% of students, 33% of faculty, and 28% of
staff indicated strong agreement with the statement "The length of Thanksgiving break (cur-rently three days) is too short."
SPRING START/END
* Students and staff were mostly neutral on the timing of the start of spring. The opinion of faculty was more mixed, with 41% strongly agreeing with idea that the spring term starts too early.
* There was little variability in faculty, staff, and student perceptions about the end of the spring term. with a plurality indicating neutralizing on the idea that it was too early, or too late.
SPRING BREAK
* The timing of spring break was not controversial, if there was a tendency it was that it was neither too late, nor too early. Around a third of students and staff agreed that it was too ear-ly; 25% of faculty so reported.
MONDAY CLASSES ON TUESDAY (SPRING)
* The scheduling changes that require day-changes were considered disruptive by a majori-ty of faculmajori-ty. Students were more negative than positive, on the topic as well.
* Similarly, Among faculty who reported teaching in the spring, 69% reported teaching all of their Monday classes on Tuesday (2/18). One in five (20%) reported holding none of their courses during these days.
* Similarly, Among faculty who reported teaching in the spring, 69% reported teaching all of their Monday classes on Tuesday (2/18). One in five (20%) reported holding none of their courses during these days.