It’s an important question that should transcend the all-too-easy cracks about how many university vice presidents or football coaches it takes to make a University of New Mexico student happy.
Because even though they attend the state’s flagship university, too many of UNM’s students are unhappy with their experience. According to the 2011 higher education Performance Effectiveness Report, released this week by the state’s Council of University Presidents, UNM has the lowest student satisfaction rate of all four-year colleges in the Land of Enchantment — 77.1 percent. So why are Lobos disenchanted with higher ed? UNM’s satisfaction score, which converts to a 2.2 GPA — won’t even get a New Mexico high school graduate a lottery scholarship. This score came from student surveys taken in 2009 and 2010; UNM’s satisfaction score has been in the 77-78 percent basement for a decade. Yes, the satisfaction level improves with time and distance — three years after graduation it rises to 85 percent — but two things mitigate that improvement: 1. UNM has an abysmal graduation rate of 13.3 percent in four years and 45.1 percent in six. That means too many students who were unhappy as undergraduates never made it through to be surveyed on their satisfaction three years after getting a degree. 2. Both UNM’s undergraduate and post-graduation satisfaction levels suffer when compared to the state’s other four-year colleges. Undergrad rates are higher than 95 percent at New Mexico State, Eastern New Mexico and Highlands, above 84 percent at New Mexico Tech and Western. Students interviewed by the Journal this week expressed dissatisfaction with everything from class availability to decision-maker engagement. UNM interim Provost Chaouki Abdallah says he’s trying to better understand what goes into the surveys to figure out if action is needed. UNM is supposed to be the state’s flagship university. Regents and university officials need to engage with the faculty to figure out how to get more students positively engaged in their education experience and graduated. The question is what that action needs to be — and it requires more than a ‘C’-level effort. This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.
