Student Faculty Interactions and Its COnsequences for Educational Achievement

Abstract

Promoting university students’ educational achievement is one of the most important tasks of any university. Researches in the related fields show that university students’ educational achievement is affected by many diverse factors. One of the social factors is student-faculty interaction. Qualitative observations of researchers show that many students complain about weakness of their relationship with faculty members and also many faculty members complain about weakness of this relationship. Data gathered from students in Engineering Faculty and Humanities Faculty in one of the biggest universities in Iran show that there is significant difference between two faculties in frequency of student-faculty interactions: There is a smaller gap between students and faculties in Humanities Faculty. Also gender is an important factor: females have more frequent interactions with their professors in relation to male students. In both faculties frequency of student-faculty interaction has a positive affect on educational achievement. This shows that among other important factors that affect educational achievement, student-faculty relationship is an important factor. Filling the gap between students and faculty members has many positive consequences for students, faculty members and for university. This can be done by some changes in formal and informal norms of university. Development of faculty members’ research duties can force them to have more efficient interactions with students.