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Student engagement and larger class enrollments: evidence from a growing mid-sized university

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  • Michael Gove

    (University of North Georgia)

Abstract

With increasing enrollment and class sizes in many colleges and universities, the potential connection between class size and student engagement has growing relevance for students, faculty, and administrators alike. I examine this potential connection, focusing empirically on a sample that allows for capturing how class size is related to various engagement measures on student evaluations of instructors over a nine-semester period in a College of Business at a growing mid-sized university. Across multiple specifications varying in both functional form and inclusion of fixed effects controlling for differences in instructors and courses, I find a consistently significant negative relationship between the class size and instructor evaluation ratings. This negative relationship is largest when increasing class size at lower enrollment levels, the negativ

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Gove, 2019. "Student engagement and larger class enrollments: evidence from a growing mid-sized university," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 39(4), pages 2550-2565.
  • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-19-00146
    as

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    File URL: http://www.accessecon.com/Pubs/EB/2019/Volume39/EB-19-V39-I4-P238.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    engagement; class size; higher education; student evaluations; college quality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I2 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education

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