Managing Surveys

Gathering Feedback on the performance of Lab Instructions is critical for Organizations to evaluate the efficiency of their Classes. Using the Survey features with Skillable's platform allows for easy management of feedback for Organizations and instructors to grow their training practices.

Best Practices for Using Surveys

Surveys provide the ability to gather end-user information regarding the efficacy of instructional material, instructor presentation and platform experience. Using surveys effectively allows you to identify opportunities for improvement as well as provide feedback to content owners on changes/products that would be beneficial for learner experience in future deliveries.

If your students have any feedback related to lab content, please make sure to inform the Platform Support Team so that we can investigate to ensure satisfactory lab delivery. We strive to provide the best in industry content and delivery, so feedback is always greatly appreciated.

Export Survey Responses

When you need to analyze the responses to a survey you have attached to a course or classes, you can export the responses to a CSV file for analysis in Excel or other programs.

There are 2 methods for exporting responses:

1. Navigate to the Survey Profile page.
2. In the quick links bar, select Export Survey Responses
or  Export Anonymous Survey Responses.

Note: The anonymous export will not contain any information identifying the respondent. -OR- Navigate to the Response Summary page for the survey.

3. Select Search. The Export link will appear next to Search.
4. Select Export.
5. Save the file where needed.

You can open this file in any program that reads an .csv file format and then analyze or format the results as needed in that program.

The file for a student survey will contain the following items:

• Survey Id

• Course Id

• Class Id

• Class

• Class Start Time

• Class End Time

• Instructor

• Instructor Email

• User (unless exported using Anonymous Survey Responses)

• User Email (unless exported using Anonymous Survey Responses)

• Question

• Label

• Response

Each row will contain one answer to one question in the survey. If a question is a matrix-type question (i.e. Rate the following on a scale of 1 to 10), each label will be considered its own question and thus have its own row.

The following are two ways to analyze the results in Excel: using filters and using PivotTables. Start by opening the file in Excel and widening the columns as necessary. Highlight and bold the top row, if desired.

Using Filters

Filters can be used if you would like to collapse the data based on different data points such as only looking at responses to a specific question or for a specific instructor. Filters can be applied to more than one column at a time. A row must match every filter to appear in the results.

To use the Filter functionality:

1. Ensure the active cell is anywhere in the data.
2. On the Home ribbon tab, select Sort & Filter > Filter. A dropdown arrow will appear in each column’s header cell.

Here are two examples of how you might want to use these filters:

Show me the responses for question X

1. To narrow the results for a specific question, select the dropdown arrow next to Question.
2. From the list, ensure only the question(s) you want to see responses for are checked and select OK.

When a filter is applied to a column, you will notice a Funnel icon added to the dropdown arrow in the column header, the row indicators change color, and the Status bar at the bottom will display X of Y records found indicating the number of filtered results.

Show me the responses for X course(s) taught by Y instructor(s):

1. To narrow the results for a specific instructor, select the dropdown arrow next to Instructor.
2. From the list, ensure only the instructor(s) you want to see responses for are checked and select OK.
3. To narrow the search even further to only certain course(s), select the dropdown arrow next to Course Id.
4. From the list, ensure only the course(s) you want to see responses for are checked and select OK.

Filters can be applied and removed from columns in any order. To remove or change a single column filter, select its dropdown and either make changes to the selections or select Clear filter from ….

Using PivotTables

PivotTables can be used to do a higher level of analyzing. You may need to practice with the PivotTable to get the analysis you want but it is highly flexible. This article will only touch on the basics with one scenario to help you get started: What is the average rating for each instructor on the Instructor’s Knowledge question.

To add a PivotTable:

1. Start with the active cell inside of the data. This allows Excel to recognize the range of cells for the data.
2. From the Insert ribbon tab, in the Tables group, select PivotTable.
3. In the Create PivotTable dialog, keep the defaults and select OK. A new tab will be added to your file.

The following steps may differ depending on your needs and the way your questions are configured in your survey.

1. In the PivotTable Fields menu box, check and drag Instructor to the Columns area at the bottom of the menu box.
2. Check and drag Question to the Filters (or Rows) area.
3. Check and drag Label to the Rows area (if Question is already there, drop Label below it).
4. Check and drag Response to the Values area. Select the dropdown on Count of Responses and select Value Field Settings.
5. In the Value Field Settings dialog, select Average in the Summarize value field by list.
6. Select Number Format and in Format Cells dialog, select the format you want the average responses to be in (in rating scale questions, it is best to go with Number and your choice of decimal places) and select OK.
7. Select OK again to close the Value Field Settings dialog.
8. In the table, click the filter dropdown next to Question, and select the knowledge question and select OK.

When using the Average summary for the Values, all data must be numerical. When a data point is not numerical, its value is ignored. If all data points are text, you will receive a #DIV/0! Error in that cell as can be seen in the screenshot for Andy Barkl. In this case, the Response scale has numbers except for 1 and 10, which are “1 Not effective” and “10 Effective”. Andy received all “10 Effective” responses to a couple of items and thus you see the error.

This article is not an indepth explanation of Excel’s filters and PivotTables. It just provides some simple examples of how you might get started in analyzing your survey responses.

Set Up Default Surveys

Surveys and survey availability can be set to be added by default on all new courses and all new classes. If different survey selections are added directly on a Course, then a class based on the course inherits the course's surveys. Surveys can be added or changed on a class.

Surveys can be added for different user Roles and presented to Users according to their role.

• Student: survey presented to the student, to provide feedback about the class.

• Instructor: survey presented to the instructor, to provide feedback about the class.

• Organization: survey presented to organization managers, to provide feedback about the class.

• To set a survey as default for all new classes and courses within your organization:

  1. Navigate to your organization profile.

  2. Select Edit.

  3. Select the Preferences tab.

  4. Scroll to the Default Surveys on new Courses and Classes section.

  5. Select Choose next to Student Survey, Instructor Survey, and Organization Survey.

  6. Configure the Survey Availability.

     • The number of hours before or after an event ends.

     • The number of days after an event ends.

  7. Save the course.

You can change the survey on a course after it has been created.

1. Navigate to the course profile.
2. Select Edit.
3. Select the Advanced tab.
4. Select Choose next to Student Survey, Instructor Survey, or Organization Survey for any surveys you want to change.
5. Search for the survey you wish to use and select OK.
6. Save the course.

Use A Survey Or Assessment

Surveys and Assessments are both means to ask questions of a user.

Surveys

Surveys are questionnaires to ask for opinions. They allow the user to evaluate an instructor, a class, a building, etc. and there is not an expectation of one correct answer.

Assessments

Assessments are used to determine the user's comprehension of Materials; it is a test or exam with correct and incorrect answers. Assessment is used to refer to tool's educators use to evaluate, measure, and report on the educational needs, learning progress, or skill acquisition of students.

An assessment is a tool allowing us to take a look at how much a student currently understands of a topic. You can use assessments to measure the progress a student has made on a topic. And you can use assessments to evaluate skills the student needs to learn or acquire.

To Evaluate Educational Needs: You may want to evaluate students before registering them for a class to evaluate if the class is the right level for them. Having students who do not have the skills needed for a class and having students that are too advanced for a class can cause everyone frustration.

Measure Learning Progress: You can compare students' learning progress by using the same assessment at the beginning and end of a course, module, or topic. This measures the skills students have acquired during training, and demostrates the value of the course. You may set up assessments following a segments in a course or at the very end of a course to measure how their learning and comprehension.

Report: Assessments are valuable tools to use when you need to report back to an employer or program showing that the student(s) is competent in the subject matter of the course.

Survey Types

A survey is a questionnaire to allow users to report their opinions and experience. They can be added to classes and taken by students, instructors or organization administrators. Each of these users can open their survey from the class' course activities. Survey responses can be accessed from the class, course, and surveys. Results can be viewed in the TMS or exported.

Surveys fall into any of three categories: Student, Instructor or Organization. Any survey created can be added to any of these categories. The category used determines access; a Student survey is only available for students, an Instructor survey for the class' instructor(s), and an Organization survey to the organization's administrators.

Surveys display on a class and class Enrollment under course Activities based on the user's role. The following details when and where surveys in the different categories are displayed to the user:

• Organizational survey - becomes available before class starts, as the first course activity and only for organization administrators.

• Instructor survey - becomes available before class starts, as the first course activity and only for class instructors.

• Student survey - becomes available to the students as the final course activity. By default, it is set to begin displaying 4 hours before class ends and continue to be available for 30 days after class ends. The timing of these settings can be changed on the class.

One survey in each category can be added to a course or a class. If a survey is added to a course, then any class created using the course will automatically have the survey(s) added. When the class is created, the survey can be removed or changed as needed. Surveys can also be added directly to classes.

Surveys are created directly in the TMS with a variety of question types available for your design:

• Multiple choice, only one answer

• Multiple choice, multiple answers

• Single textbox

• Multiple textboxes

• Comment/Essay textbox

• Rating scale

• Matrix, one answer per row

• Matrix, multiple answers per row

If you need to have permissions to create surveys or see survey responses, please submit a Support ticket at https://skill.info/support.