Unless the University extends it, the data collection phase of the Postgraduate Research Survey ends on Friday, May 17th.
If you haven't heard about this, it's not for lack of our trying!
We're closing in on a 90% response rate!
We're now in the final days of the Postgraduate Research Experience Survey (the PRES). The PRES is a sector wide survey conduct at Manchester every other year. It is our only aggregative view of what things are like for our PGR students. The school uses PRES data to try to make systematic changes for your collective benefit. If your voice isn’t included then we might miss something that’s important to you!
A few fun PRES facts:
- It’s completely anonymous. No personal data is associated with your answers. When you hit “submit” all we learn about you is that you completed the PRES.
- It’s completely voluntary. There is no requirement for you to do it and no penalty if you don’t. If you want to stop being nagged by Bijan, just send him a not saying you’re opting out. No reason needed. We’ll purge all the non-responder lists from our computers right after the PRES closes.
- Really, it’s voluntary. We want your responses and will nag, but there is no harm and no foul if you choose not to do or just flake out.
- The university will donate £1 to student mental health charities for each completed PRES.
- Not everyone is eligible for this round of PRES!
- Simon will donate a very fancy pants coffee machine to the PGR common area if we hit 90% in our response rate.
How fancy pants? It’s password protected!
At the moment, our response rate is 78.4%, up from 53.4% in the 2017 PRES. We're second best in the University (after Maths at 81.0%! <-- WE CAN BEAT MATHS!!!!). We're well ahead of the faculty (39.4%) and university (38.5%). We're the only school whose week 6 rate is better than their 2017 final rate!
Well done! Thanks to you all for participating.
The PRES is not the only feedback mechanisms, of course! We welcome suggestions, feedback, and identification of issues.