College survey threads on boards.ie

C.K Dexter Haven

When I went to college, even an end of year dissertation undergraduate project that necessitated a survey of some kind would have required strict adherence to a particular methodology when carrying out the survey.

Getting anonymous users from a website, wouldn't have passed mustard. A post graduate survey would have even stricter conditions.

Why are people constantly going this route on boards.ie. Are they really college students or is it marketing firms in disguise?

I know a lot of the survey requests are linked to survey monkey etc but still, there's no way on knowing who the person is who completes the survey, regardless of what questions are asked- my understanding is that colleges don't accept this approach for any student survey as the research methodology is absolutely flawed.

Are college survey requests a major or minor problem on boards? I can't believe that colleges are accepting the results of surveys by students successful in using boards.ie for their so called research.

Insect Overlord

They probably aren't final dissertation surveys. Plenty of continuous assessment though!

C.K Dexter Haven

Insect Overlord wrote: »

They probably aren't final dissertation surveys. Plenty of continuous assessment though!

I'd have been ripped apart even for a 2nd year project if i used something annonymous like boards or the equivalent back in the day- I'd have no way of verifying simple things like male/female ratio, demographic of responders etc

Zaph

C.K Dexter Haven wrote: »

Are college survey requests a major or minor problem on boards? I can't believe that colleges are accepting the results of surveys by students successful in using boards.ie for their so called research.

They're a minor problem really. Sure, the volume of them has increased substantially, even between last year and this, but they're easily dealt with. More annoying is where you have an entire class signing up and it's all of them posting in a single thread because some lecturer told them to interact on a social medium as part of some assignment. I banned 15 from a particular IT for this last week.

C.K Dexter Haven wrote: »

I'd have been ripped apart even for a 2nd year project if i used something annonymous like boards or the equivalent back in the day- I'd have no way of verifying simple things like male/female ratio, demographic of responders etc

It's one of two things - 1) standards in education are slipping and the quality of acceptable research is lower than it was when you were in college; or 2) students are becoming increasingly lazy-assed. Personally I favour the latter.

P_1

Zaph wrote: »

They're a minor problem really. Sure, the volume of them has increased substantially, even between last year and this, but they're easily dealt with. More annoying is where you have an entire class signing up and it's all of them posting in a single thread because some lecturer told them to interact on a social medium as part of some assignment. I banned 15 from a particular IT for this last week.

Not sure if that's lazy lecturing or lazy students to be honest. Either way it sounds like a pain in the backside

Zaph

P_1 wrote: »

Not sure if that's lazy lecturing or lazy students to be honest. Either way it sounds like a pain in the backside

In reality I'd say it's a little from column A and a little from column B. I just like to give out about students.

Sarky

Friend of mine did her PhD on immersion in gaming, she came here to the Games forum for some of her survey data. Seems like a logical choice, really. As I recall the regulars thought it a pretty decent survey. Of course, she did ask permission first, as well as make sure she was asking the right questions, so that probably had something to do with it.

Nothing wrong with them, if they're done right. But most of them aren't done right. Not even close.

Nody

Sarky wrote: »

Nothing wrong with them, if they're done right. But most of them aren't done right. Not even close.

Very true; there's a serious lack of lolcats or pony power in them; I mean how can a survey ever be considered complete with out a lolcat (to assess the mental stability of the person and reward them in a non commital way)?!

biko

The surveys may be pilots in a bigger project. The pilot survey shows the researcher that there is some interesting data to be gleaned from the material.
The researcher can then fine-tune the survey and conduct it on a smaller scale but still get good results.

Then again I come across people in Edu forums asking questions that could be researched in seconds on google/wiki so yeah, students be lazy too.

Overheal

Were it me, because I'm a cranky c*nt, I'd just file a complaint with the ITs in question if it was a whole class signing up and making half assed attempts at doing assignments.