Dr Amanda Gibney, Dr Niamh Moore, Mr Feargal Murphy & Dr Sara O’Sullivan

Students embarking on life at university have many and varied expectations.  Whether or not these expectations are met can impact on students’ engagement with their course of study.  Efforts to enhance student engagement must start with a knowledge and understanding of students’ initial expectations^¹.

International and anecdotal and international evidence would suggest that there are a number of areas of concern in relation to the first year, for staff and students alike, including issues of attendance, engagement, the requisite skills set and the understanding of the transition from second to third level education. To date there has been no clear understanding of the expectations that Irish students bring to their first semester at university and this is a major gap in terms of assessing the dynamics of student interaction with the university at this critical juncture in their academic life.

This paper presents the results of a survey undertaken with first year students at University College Dublin (UCD) to empirically assess their expectations of teaching and learning in their first few weeks of university life. UCD has recently undergone modularisation and semesterisation with the result that students now undertake 50% of their assessment within three months of entering the university. Their expectations on entering university can therefore have a significant impact on their academic attainment in the first semester with a knock-on effect to their entire first year performance. The results of the survey also provide significant insight into the anxieties faced by students, their motivation for third level participation and their perception of their own skill sets at the beginning of their university career. The results of the empirical study provide a clear foundation on which the University’s response to meeting students’ learning needs, first year engagement and teaching and learning development issues can be enhanced. 

¹ McInnis, C., James, R., & Hartley, R. (2000) Trends in the First Year Experience in Australian Universities, Canberra: DETYA [http://www.dest.gov.au/archive/highered/eippubs/eip00_6/fye.pdf].