Student engagement for student success: pre-commencement strategies via KickStart

Australia’s large and diverse student cohort challenges our universities to provide innovative and integrated ways of supporting students at an appropriate scale. In response, we developed an initiative called KickStart to help students become more engaged with their unit (i.e. subject) content and feel better prepared and motivated at a critical stage of their studies. This paper investigates student uptake and perceptions of this online initiative, the delivery of which commenced 2 weeks before the start of the semester. A student survey (n = 1165) delivered evidence for a high student uptake. In addition, students reported that KickStart provided them with a useful start and helped them to understand learning outcomes. This initiative highlights the value of providing students with online resources and activities tailored to the unit content in the lead-up to the semester.