It’s been easy to write off the review of the Office for Students’ review of NSS as something of a damp squib.
We’ve come a long way from the apocalyptic language in the original bureaucracy memo – quite where those ideas came may only be revealed in Michelle Donelan’s hotly anticipated autobiography – and phase two of the review left us looking at an evolution rather than a revolution.
Since then OfS has been testing both statements and direct questions on a subsample of 2022 students. There was stuff to welcome (on mental health), stuff to ponder (the loss of the “community” question and the possible move to statements rather than questions), and stuff to grin and bear (the inevitable “free speech” question). And of course the all important replacement of the word “satisfaction” with the more nebulous speculation about “the quality of my course” (compared to what, exactly?).
