The present research aimed at identifying the sources of influence on undergraduate students' satisfaction and academic performance at university. Preliminary findings showed that students' experiences at university were characterised by the quality of academic and pastoral support available, the extent to which their degree programme equipped them with the skills to succeed in life beyond university, their relationship with peers and the quality of their social life, their perception of the workload, anxiety while meeting academic challenges and motivation to succeed at university. Students' satisfaction was determined by the extent to which they felt that they received a good quality of teaching and support for personal problems, happiness with the degree programme, good relations with peers, an opportunity to think creatively and independently about the subject being studied, availability of study materials and the acquisition of skills that made them employable. Academic performance was predicted by the extent to which they were motivated to do well on their course, their organisational skills while meeting deadlines and not feeling overloaded by the academic demands on their course. An absence of distractions such as extracurricular activities and events in one's personal life, a positive perception of one's own academic ability in relation to peers, perfectionism, enhanced focussed when stressed, experience of multiple choice exams and having members of family who had attended university all correlated positively with performance while a positive perception of Blackboard and working only hard enough to obtain the sought degree class correlated negatively with performance. Higher A-level grades and attendance at a Comprehensive school were also associated with better academic performance.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:573157 |
| Date | January 2012 |
| Creators | Sunderarajan, Jahnavi |
| Publisher | University of Bristol |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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