NC State University
Graduating Senior and Alumni Survey(s)
College/Department/Program Inserts
Revising Your Insert (or creating a brand new one)
In reviewing your current insert, or in thinking about using an insert for the first time, you should think about your planning and assessment needs. A college/department/program insert along with the questions on the campus-wide Graduating Senior or Alumni Survey can provide you with valuable information to use in planning, for your accreditation and program review, etc. Having UPA administer an insert designed to collect the information you need can save you time and money in trying to collect such data on your own, as well as help to minimize the 'over-surveying' of our students and alumni.
FAQs
What does UPA do?
The OIRP Survey staff will be happy to help you develop an entirely new insert and/or evaluate and revise your current one. When we have the final draft we will prepare your insert for
administration online. UPA will identify the appropriate survey population, and send all invitations and follow-up reminders to non-respondents. (For the Graduating Senior Survey we also provide regularly updated lists of respondents and nonrespondents on our secure website to enable departments to follow-up with their students as they see fit.) After the survey closes we clean and analyze the data, prepare reports on results, and then distribute the reports, data, and all necessary documentation to your college/department.
What information does UPA need to create an insert?
All we need are the questions and response options along
with any specific instructions for students. Don't worry about trying to make the
copy of the insert you give us look pretty. Also, tell us who you want to answer
your insert, e.g., all students in your college, in your department, in a
specific program, etc.
How many questions can be on an insert?
While there are no real limits to the number of questions you can include in a given
insert, please remember that respondents are more likely to simply stop answering
the questions and/or go to the next insert if yours gets too long. I would suggest keeping your insert to under 30 questions. You are welcome to have both forced-choice and open-ended questions. In general it is not a good idea to use your insert to have respondents evaluate a long list of courses in the major.
Are there any limits on the types of response options that can be used?
No, you are not restricted to any particular type of response (e.g., you don't have to use a 'strongly agree' to 'strongly disagree' response scale). You should use whatever is appropriate for the question to get the information you need. Again, we can help!
Can respondents complete more than one insert?
Yes. For example, double majors are are asked to complete an insert for each of their majors (assuming that both majors have asked us to administer an insert for them). In addition, respondents could have an insert for their college and then for their department. There can also be inserts for specific academic programs.
For more information on NC State
Student Surveys contact:
Dr. Nancy Whelchel, Associate Director for Survey Research
Office of Institutional Planning and Research
Box 7002
NCSU
Phone: (919) 515-4184
Email: Nancy_Whelchel@ncsu.edu
Updated: February 2011