The sector barometer
The StudentPulse Student Experience Index
One composite measure of how students rate their experience overall, on a 0-10 scale, drawn from every check-in response. We read the StudentPulse Index on the academic year, because that is the cycle students and institutions actually live in.
The year held steady
Composite 0-10 index, mean of all check-in answers, finished responses. Two academic years overlaid.
Across the whole dataset the index stayed in a tight band between 7.7 and 8.3 for the entire year, and the previous academic year sits almost on top of it. That steadiness is the point: the responding base has grown several times over since 2020, yet the baseline has held. Student-rated experience has been resilient as the dataset scaled.
We deliberately don't show a single line back to 2020. In 2020 the data came from a handful of institutions; today it is many hundreds. A multi-year average would track who joined the platform more than how students feel, so it would mislead. The honest, stable signal is the within-year shape, which repeats.
The rhythm of the academic year
The average hides the most useful pattern. Students start each semester near the top of the scale and lose ground toward each exam window. The index dips in December and again in April, the two assessment periods, and recovers as the next term begins. Split by domain, the three move differently.
Monthly means for the three domains across 2025/26.
Social (8.0) and Academic (8.0) sit highest: the relationships and the learning experience are resilient. Personal wellbeing (7.7), the domain that holds stress, finances, time and confidence, sits lowest and swings most, softening through the winter and spring exam windows. The pressure of the academic calendar lands hardest on the personal domain, while the social fabric holds. That is the assessment moment, seen three ways.
How we measure it
The index is the mean of every check-in response (0-100, rescaled to 0-10), finished responses only, aggregated by month and academic year. It is a composite barometer, not a fixed-cohort panel: the responding population grows and shifts, so we report the within-year arc and year-on-year comparison rather than a long calendar trend. Cross-institution aggregate; no single institution identified.