Placements lead at 17.8% — what 1,589 midwifery students report
Scope. UK NSS open‑text comments for Midwifery (CAH02-04-04) students across academic years 2018–2025.
Volume. ~1,589 comments; 98.6% successfully categorised to a single primary topic.
Overall mood. Roughly 52.8% Positive, 44.6% Negative, 2.6% Neutral (positive:negative ≈ 1.18:1).
What students are saying
Midwifery students focus most on real‑world experience. Comments about placements account for 17.8% of all feedback—by far the largest single topic—yet sentiment is close to neutral and slightly negative (index −0.8), and notably below the sector baseline for the same topic (−12.6 points).
A second theme concentrates on the mechanics of delivery: scheduling and timetabling, organisation and management, course communications and remote learning. Taken together with placements, this “delivery & ops” set makes up about one‑third of all comments (~33.0%). Tone across these operational categories leans negative relative to sector, especially for organisation and management (index −29.3; −15.4 vs sector), timetabling (−23.4; −6.9 vs sector) and course communications (−43.2; −7.4 vs sector).
Balancing that, students are consistently positive about people‑centred support. Teaching Staff (index +35.6), Personal Tutor (+29.8) and general Student support (+13.9) are well‑regarded, with Availability of teaching staff standing out (index +53.1; +13.7 vs sector). Students also report strong gains in Personal development (+56.9) and a positive Student life (+32.8).
In Assessment & Feedback, the picture splits. Marking criteria draws strong criticism (index −48.8), while Feedback (−13.6) and Assessment methods (−22.2) are negative but sit slightly better than sector on tone. Clarity and predictability remain the currency in this space.
Finally, some topics appear less prominent here than sector‑wide: Module choice/variety (0.4% vs 4.2%), Type and breadth of course content (3.3% vs 6.9%) and Learning resources (1.0% vs 3.8%) attract fewer comments by share, reflecting a student conversation more concentrated on placements and day‑to‑day delivery.
Top categories by share (Midwifery vs sector)
| Category |
Section |
Share % |
Sector % |
Δ pp |
Sentiment idx |
Δ vs sector |
| Placements/ fieldwork/ trips |
Learning opportunities |
17.8 |
3.4 |
14.4 |
−0.8 |
−12.6 |
| Student support |
Academic support |
9.5 |
6.2 |
3.3 |
+13.9 |
+0.7 |
| Teaching Staff |
The teaching on my course |
5.8 |
6.7 |
−0.9 |
+35.6 |
+0.1 |
| Personal Tutor |
Academic support |
5.6 |
3.2 |
2.4 |
+29.8 |
+11.1 |
| COVID-19 |
Others |
5.0 |
3.3 |
1.6 |
−31.0 |
+2.0 |
| Remote learning |
The teaching on my course |
5.0 |
3.5 |
1.5 |
−10.5 |
−1.4 |
| Delivery of teaching |
The teaching on my course |
4.5 |
5.4 |
−1.0 |
+6.5 |
−2.2 |
| Marking criteria |
Assessment and feedback |
4.3 |
3.5 |
0.7 |
−48.8 |
−3.1 |
| Organisation, management of course |
Organisation and management |
4.0 |
3.3 |
0.7 |
−29.3 |
−15.4 |
| Scheduling/ timetabling |
Organisation and management |
3.4 |
2.9 |
0.6 |
−23.4 |
−6.9 |
Most negative categories (share ≥ 2%)
| Category |
Section |
Share % |
Sector % |
Δ pp |
Sentiment idx |
Δ vs sector |
| Marking criteria |
Assessment and feedback |
4.3 |
3.5 |
0.7 |
−48.8 |
−3.1 |
| Workload |
Organisation and management |
2.4 |
1.8 |
0.5 |
−45.4 |
−5.4 |
| Communication about course and teaching |
Organisation and management |
2.8 |
1.7 |
1.2 |
−43.2 |
−7.4 |
| COVID-19 |
Others |
5.0 |
3.3 |
1.6 |
−31.0 |
+2.0 |
| Organisation, management of course |
Organisation and management |
4.0 |
3.3 |
0.7 |
−29.3 |
−15.4 |
| Scheduling/ timetabling |
Organisation and management |
3.4 |
2.9 |
0.6 |
−23.4 |
−6.9 |
| Student voice |
Student voice |
3.2 |
1.8 |
1.4 |
−22.7 |
−3.4 |
Most positive categories (share ≥ 2%)
| Category |
Section |
Share % |
Sector % |
Δ pp |
Sentiment idx |
Δ vs sector |
| Personal development |
Learning community |
2.3 |
2.5 |
−0.2 |
+56.9 |
−2.9 |
| Availability of teaching staff |
Academic support |
2.4 |
2.1 |
0.3 |
+53.1 |
+13.7 |
| Teaching Staff |
The teaching on my course |
5.8 |
6.7 |
−0.9 |
+35.6 |
+0.1 |
| Student life |
Learning community |
2.3 |
3.2 |
−0.9 |
+32.8 |
+0.7 |
| Personal Tutor |
Academic support |
5.6 |
3.2 |
2.4 |
+29.8 |
+11.1 |
| Student support |
Academic support |
9.5 |
6.2 |
3.3 |
+13.9 |
+0.7 |
| Type and breadth of content |
Learning opportunities |
3.3 |
6.9 |
−3.6 |
+11.7 |
−10.9 |
What this means in practice
-
Treat placements as a designed service. Plan allocations and schedules early, set and honour a clear change window, publish a single source of truth, and make short, consistent in‑situ feedback part of the experience. Improving the placement journey lifts sentiment in the wider delivery topics too.
-
Tighten the operational rhythm. Name an owner for timetables and programme communications, publish weekly “what changed and why” updates, and keep a visible log of actions and resolutions. This is where Midwifery students register the most friction compared with sector.
-
Make assessment expectations unmistakable. Share annotated exemplars, checklist‑style rubrics and realistic feedback SLAs. This directly addresses the strongest negative driver—Marking criteria—and helps Feedback feel more useful.
Data at a glance (2018–2025)
- Highest‑volume topics by share: Placements (~17.8%), Student support (~9.5%), Teaching Staff (~5.8%), Personal Tutor (~5.6%), Remote learning/COVID‑19 (each ~5.0%).
- Delivery & ops cluster (placements, scheduling, organisation, course communications, remote learning): ~33.0% of all comments; typically more negative than sector on tone.
- People & growth cluster (personal tutor, student support, teaching staff, availability of staff, delivery of teaching, personal development, student life): ~32.4% of comments with a strong positive tone.
- How to read the numbers. Each comment is assigned one primary topic; share is that topic’s proportion of all comments. Sentiment is calculated per sentence and summarised as an index from −100 (more negative than positive) to +100 (more positive than negative), then averaged at category level.
How Student Voice Analytics helps you
Student Voice Analytics turns open‑text survey comments into clear priorities for action. It tracks topics, sentiment and movement by year for all disciplines, including Midwifery, so teams can target high‑impact areas such as Placements, Scheduling, Organisation, Communications and Assessment & Feedback. It also produces concise, anonymised theme summaries and representative comments to brief programme teams, partners and governance without trawling through thousands of responses.
Crucially, it enables like‑for‑like sector comparisons across CAH codes and by demographics (e.g., year of study, domicile, mode of study, campus/site, commuter status), so you can evidence progress relative to the right peer group. Analyse at whole‑institution level or drill down to schools, departments, sites/providers and cohorts, segment by year, and export insights to share in dashboards, decks or web reports.