What Our Students Say

Green Mountain College students say their professors at GMC are more than just teachers—they are role models, mentors, and guides for continuous, life-long learning. Students also say they feel intensively involved in their education at GMC. They collaborate with each other in solving problems, and grapple with real-world issues in preparation for the complex challenges they will encounter in daily life after college. Our student body is also highly engaged, especially in service to the community. How do we know? The data is reflected in the 2008 National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), the most comprehensive assessment of effective practices in higher education. The survey includes data from students at 744 colleges and universities across the country. Green Mountain College students gave high marks to their experiences on each of these benchmarks of excellence:

Chart 1: Level of Academic Challenge




Chart 2: Active & Collaborative Learning




Chart 3: Student/Faculty Interaction




Chart 4: Enriching Educational Experiences




Chart 5: Supportive Campus Environment




In all five categories, Green Mountain averages were above, and in most cases dramatically above the national averages, for both first year students and seniors. In active and collaborative learning and student-faculty interaction we did particularly well, scoring far above New England private institutions.

First year students gave us very high marks relative to our peers on:

• Participating in community based projects (service learning)
• Having serious conversations with students with very different religious and political views, and understanding people of other racial and ethnic backgrounds
• Developing high quality relations with faculty members
• Developing a personal code of ethics
• Contributing to the welfare of their community

Seniors similarly gave us high marks on those items. They also said that they were more engaged than most other schools in:

• Giving class presentations
• Writing more short papers
• Actively attending art exhibits, plays, concerts, and theatre performances than their peers.