# Summary of the StV-Evaluation | 2022
From 31.01. to 13.02. we collected your feedback on our work as ÖH Student Union (StV) for Informatik & AI.

81 people participated in our survey.
These are the detailed results for each question and what we plan to do as a consequence.

Every question could be answered using a scale from **1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree)**, unless noted otherwise. The average and median are given to account for outliers.
Some of the results of a category’s open questions have been moved and will be discussed at the appropriate category, since there was a lot of overlap between them.

### I am generally happy with the work of the StV.
AVG: 5.8, MED: 6

## Information and Transparency
### I would like to receive more information regarding the StV's work in commissions.
AVG: 4.43, MED: 4
### I would be interested in reading a monthly newsletter about the StV's work.
AVG: 4.14, MED: 4
### I would like to watch the StV's meetings publicly.
AVG: 3.31, MED: 3
Twelve people voted >=6.
### Open question regarding Information and Transparency / Our Conclusion:
Generally, interest in our work was mixed. Most of you would appreciate a bit more regular updates in our #öh-work channel, but a full newsletter or public meetings might not be worth the hassle.
Some of you told us however that you don’t feel like you have a good idea of what we are doing. We agree, which is why we are in the process of creating a public dashboard to give you some “live” insight into what we are currently working on.
Some also said that they don’t know enough about our job, as is also apparent from the fact that many of your suggestions and criticism are not things we can be responsible for (e.g. the enrolment process). Therefore, we are considering organising an event in which we discuss the structure of the ÖH and what it means to join the StV. Lastly, we are also updating our [team website](http://informatik.jku.at/students/team/) to give you a better idea of who we are.
You will also receive an update on all of that soon!

## Atmosphere and Focus
### I feel like the StV provides a welcoming and inclusive atmosphere for all students.
AVG: 5.98, MED: 6
### I feel like I can always ask a member of the StV when I have a study-related question.
AVG: 5.77, MED: 7
### I feel like the StV is competent when it comes to answering questions.
AVG: 5.86, MED: 6
### I feel like the StV represents me well.
AVG: 5.36, MED: 6
### Open question regarding Atmosphere and Focus / Our Conclusion:
There was criticism saying that **it is hard to “join the club”** if you don’t speak German / aren’t extroverted. We have reflected on this and feel like this is mostly a problem with our current online situation: Group calls are always dominated by extroverts, and side-talks in different languages are really hard.
We are really hoping to improve on this because we feel like this wasn’t as big of a problem in the past. Still, meetings in presence might be our best way out of that and we are looking forward to the next semester.

Regarding **representation in the AI studies**, we received complaints that you feel like not much is happening on our part to improve them and that we are confident with the status quo. While some of that critique might be warranted, please keep in mind that the whole study is still relatively young. This is not meant to excuse everything happening in the study, but to help you understand that we are still building and training our team of AI specialists in the ÖH that have actually gone through the AI study and can better address those issues.
Despite that, there is a lot of work being done by some of the StV members already, and a lot of things are being changed right now (check out information from the study commission AI in the pinned messages of #öh-work for some examples). Unfortunately, it takes a lot of time to change a study: Keep in mind that many different players from the university have to agree on decisions before they can be implemented. We are doing our best! If you feel like we are missing a very obvious solution to something bothering you, please don’t hesitate to hit us up via [e-mail]!

Furthermore, we were also told that **we sometimes only represent a minority opinion** regarding topics we contact Profs about. This is obviously something we want to change, and we will try to increase polling for decisions before enacting measures (see for example our procedure on online exams in Maths for AI III). However, for the sake of speed and efficiency, if a situation has an obvious negative impact on students, we will also continue to react if a single student asks us to (e.g. “Our exam grades have not been handed out for 6 weeks”) without polling all of you first. We will also continue to sometimes only represent a minority in need for special consideration (e.g. when a course with official course language English is not taught in English because only some students have problems understanding German).

Lastly, we also received criticism regarding **our stance on political correctness** on the Discord-Server. While we have discussed this topic before, we would like to quickly reiterate what the purpose of the StV is: Our main goal here is to help you through your studies, be it by offering a place to exchange ideas, by arguing with Profs or by guiding you to resources. If people do not feel welcome on our communication platforms or don’t feel like they can ask for our help, our ability to reach this goal is severely limited. Therefore, we will always try to provide a welcoming and inclusive atmosphere first, everything else is just “nice to have”.
We are happy to see that judging from the results of the previous questions we seem to be doing a quite good job at that.

### What we should put more focus on:
We were asked to be more proactive about **asking students how they feel in their studies**. We would like to remind you about our weekly “Sprechstunden-Cafés”: Their job is first and foremost so we can listen to your problems and rants and act on them, and you are very welcome to join them. We are aware that discussions and jokes have sometimes dominated the channels in the current online mode and made us lose focus, and we will try to improve this in the next semester. Judging from the current developments, it seems like we will be able to meet on campus again, which should really help in this regard.
Events like the Freaky Feedback Thursday were also meant to provide you another opportunity to voice your struggles, and we have received several new “tasks” to take into commissions with the university.

We like the idea of having an **FAQ** - we actually already started one last year! Unfortunately, this process is very time-consuming, and it would ideally be done in cooperation with the university-wide ÖH. We will try to find the resources to put something together, but it might take a while. If you feel motivated to collect questions for us to answer, hit us up!

We would like to ask you to forward your complaints regarding **enrolment as an international student** to the [REMI](https://oeh.jku.at/abschnitte/remi-referat-f%C3%BCr-migration-und-integration), the ÖH experts on that topic: They will try to get things changed for you. We have decided to create a new channel for internationals on Discord to help you exchange information on that more easily.

### Event ideas you want us to organize:
We are happy to see that we have already been planning on doing some of the things you are looking forward to:
- **Hackathons:** See Google Hashcode, Hacktoberfest, Advent Of Code - if you want us to participate in something else, hit us up!
- **JKU GAMES (LAN & DICE):** Circle 29.04.-01.05. red in your calendar, you won’t get anything done that weekend (or the week afterward :P)
- **Opportunities to find study buddies** and to learn with one another: We actually do already have several events that might help you out here:
- In the winter semester, all BA Informatik students must go through a Mentoring at the beginning of their studies, which aims to answer questions and build first study groups. Its AI equivalent is being extended for the next years to come.
- This is not to be confused with the JKU-wide first semester mentoring/tutoring, which also follows a similar goal but is not just for people of your study. You can also join as a Master's student, there will be a TNF-Mentoring this summer semester as well. If you want to join in, hit up [e-mail]!
- Join our Regulars’ Tables (Stammtische) once they can take place again, they are a great way to get to know people. Similarly, we are planning another barbeque this semester, the next Welcome-Event is coming up the semester after that, and there are of course our regular Cafés, etc.

We know, it’s hard to get to know people during Covid times, but there is a lot being planned as we speak to help you out. Keep an eye on the #current-events channel to always be informed about what we have planned.

Some other ideas you had:
- **Soccer Tournament**: This is something the [ÖH Sport-Referat](https://oeh.jku.at/abschnitte/sportreferat) might be interested in. We have forwarded your idea to them, and they are actually planning something like that already. We have told them to update us on any developments and will forward them to you.
- **Master-Information-Evening**: Thank you for that interesting suggestion, we had not considered that yet: We have decided to offer an informational evening into what it takes to finish your Master studies! It will take place sometime in the middle of this semester and should then be offered regularly if there is enough interest. Stay tuned for updates once we have figured out the details.

## Discord
### Are you already using our server, and how frequently?
| Answer | Responses |
| -------------------------------- | :-: |
| I don't or barely use the server. | 4 |
| I usually check it weekly or more often. | 62 |
| I usually check it when I need help with exams or homework. | 42 |
| I usually check it when I get pinged. | 27 |

It was possible to select multiple answers.

### If you are not on our server: What are your reasons? (skip this question otherwise)
| Answer | Responses |
| -------------------------------- | :-: |
| I don't like the way the server is administered. | 1 |
| I don't feel like I need the services offered there. | 3 |
| I don't use Discord. | 1 |

It was possible to select multiple answers.

### Open question regarding Discord / Our Conclusion:
We received criticism regarding the **moderation of the Discord server**. We have talked about this topic extensively and have established a team of moderators in response last semester. So far, we have not had any incidents and the mods have not been asked to step in (except for Spambots). We would like to remind you that you can ping @mod if you feel like moderating is needed. If you would like to apply to join the Mod-Team, hit us up!
We would also like to remind you that you can always contact Sarah (@satschi) for more sensitive topics.

We were asked to **ping less**. Currently, we only use @everyone to ping events relevant for all students and posts on very important information. We are planning to continue doing so, this is already the absolute minimum we can figure out, and it’s usually less than four pings per month. If that is still too much, you can always turn off notifications in the server settings.
@informatik and @ai are being pinged about weekly for the Cafés. We have discussed different measures to decrease those pings (e.g. by implementing new roles for café-updates) and might experiment a bit or poll you on that in the near future. For now, we will try out how well the current system works with events in person.

We were asked to **promote the server more aggressively** to get first-semester students before they spawn WhatsApp-Groups like crazy. Believe us, we have tried. We are currently promoting the server in all Mentorings and first semester courses, information sheets, first semester counselling, we are sending emails and we are invading the WhatsApp groups to try and get people to join. We have also gotten in contact with some of the preparation courses for CS/AI subjects as well to try and advertise the server as soon as someone sets foot on university grounds :P

We also got a lot of positive feedback about the server, which is always nice to hear. Thank you all for devoting your time and helping your fellow students!

## Communication
### I have no problem receiving information solely in English.
AVG: 6.04, MED: 7

9 people answered with a score of 2 or less.

### Open question regarding Communication / Our Conclusion:
We will continue communicating bilingual for all official matters of high relevance, invitations etc., but might stop doing so for easily understandable things such as Café announcements and for purely informational posts (such as this one).
You can always ask us questions if you don’t understand something, we are happy to help!

## Demographics
### What are you studying?
| Study | % respondents |
| :------: | :----: |
| Informatik | ~52 |
| AI | ~46 |
| Both | ~3 |

### How many semesters have you been studying this subject, including this semester? In other words, how many semesters have you had us as your StV?

| Semester | Amount |
| :------: | :----: |
| 1 | 18 |
| 2-3 | 25 |
| 4-5 | 19 |
| 6-7 | 9 |
| >7 | 9 |

### General open question / Our Conclusion:
We were asked to **no longer use Google Forms**. While we do understand concerns regarding data privacy, the straight fact is that we have not yet found an alternative that provides the same level of functionality (e.g. live editing, automatic summaries, validity checks, hosting) - we do however limit the extent with which we use Forms, e.g. we do not ask you to create a Google account. The ÖH JKU is currently building a new website which should also be capable of handling surveys. Once that is done, we will reconsider switching tools.

---

Thank you for your kind words and all your feedback! We hope we could clear up all questions and you like the way we are headed. We are planning on polling you again next semester.
If there are still things that seem unclear or if you think we missed your answer, feel free to ping us or send us an email to [e-mail]!
We are looking forward to seeing you in person again!