A new framework for the design and evaluation of a learning institution's student engagement activities

ABSTRACT

In this article we explore the potential for attempts to encourage student engagement to be conceptualised as behaviour change activity, and specifically whether a new framework to guide such activity has potential value for the Higher Education (HE) sector. The Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) (Michie, Susan, Maartje M van Stralen, and Robert West. 2011. “The Behaviour Change Wheel: A New Method for Characterising and Designing Behaviour Change Interventions.” Implementation Science : IS 6 (1): 42. doi:10.1186/1748-5908-6-42) is a framework for the systematic design and development of behaviour change interventions. It has yet to be applied to the domain of student engagement. This article explores its potential, by assessing whether the BCW comprehensively aligns with the state of student engagement as currently presented in the HE literature. This work achieves two things. It firstly allows a prima facie assessment of whether student engagement activity can be readily aligned with the BCW framework. It also highlights omissions and prevalence of activity types in the HE sector, compared with other sectors where behaviour change practice is being successfully applied.

KEYWORDS:

• Student engagement
• higher education
• behaviour change
• attainment
• learning gain

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Caroline Wilson http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0213-506X

Christine Broughan http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9179-9599

Melissa Marselle http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3245-7473

Notes

1 Confidence might have been coded as being determined by physical capability had there been an example in the guidance of encouraging a physical skill, such as a medical student being able to administer an injection.

2 However, this is not the case for medical, art and dance subjects; generalisations made in the three HE student engagement guidance for all students might need adjusting for these more physical disciplines.