If there’s one survey you fill out this year, make it the Year End Assessment

Princeton undergraduates are constantly bombarded with surveys. Many come from fellow students seeking data for projects, but some also come from the University. Just this year, I’ve been emailed to fill out a survey on my Community Living Advisers, another on my advising experience, and one on University Health Services (UHS). However, all of these pale in comparison to the massive Year End Assessment, an annual University survey that takes 40 minutes to complete.

It seems a little ridiculous that the University needs to collect this much data from us. So I sat down last week with Vice Provost for Institutional Research Jed Marsh, who is responsible for the design and implementation of the survey, to see what it’s about. What I learned was that the University cares about collecting good data — but it needs to centralize its efforts.

Marsh explains that the survey provides University administrators with key data and crosstabs that they aren’t otherwise able to access. Since the University doesn’t collect information about faith, specific heritage, or racial characteristics elsewhere, it’s otherwise impossible to know if outreach to all groups is succeeding. For example, recent Year End Assessment and Senior Survey data indicate that Jewish students, on average, are much more satisfied than other faith groups with their educational experience at Princeton. This type of data would be impossible to obtain without the Year End Assessment.

These insights are critically important to Princeton’s goals to maintain an inclusive community. For example, Marsh told me that survey crosstabs are often shared with campus offices, such as data on how first-generation or low-income students fare in comparison to their peers. Marsh also noted that though the share of the student population eligible for Pell grants has tripled over the past 20 years, the data indicates that there has not been any significant change in their educational experience on metrics such as graduation rates. Many of the well-being indicators on the survey are also used by UHS and Campus Life to identify where more student support is needed.

Though Marsh notes that the response rate for first-years, sophomores, and juniors on the Year End Assessment is a robust 60 percent, there is still concern about the data missing from those who didn’t finish the survey. The problem is especially acute for smaller groups, such as majors like Slavic Languages and Literature or ethnic groups like Native Hawaiians. For the University to accurately gauge the needs and experiences of these students, it’s critical for them to respond.

A potential reason why students don’t end up finishing surveys like the Year End Assessment may be survey fatigue. When students are constantly hit with requests to respond to surveys, it can decrease the quality of responses or lower completion rates. In some ways, the University is contributing to the problem by sending students too many surveys.

The Service Point, University Health Services, and the Center for Career Development, among other campus offices, typically email students a survey after an engagement. But putting yet another survey in the inbox of students is not the right way to go. When campus offices need to collect data, collecting it through centralized methods ensures that the survey is designed by professionals, boosts response rates, and reduces student survey fatigue.

The work of institutional research continues. Marsh tells me that his office is working on making more of the data collected available to allow students to better understand the community they live in. Given the other data that the office collects, such as surveys of student outcomes multiple years post-degree, Marsh believes that synthesizing the data will help students make more informed decisions about their futures. As the Year End Assessment draws to a close on April 30, Marsh hopes that students will take the time to seriously complete the survey in their inboxes.

Institutional research is an important way for the University to gauge its progress on its mission of education, and when done right, it can help point administrators in the right direction and find gaps in its work. The University should do more to centralize its survey work. But we can also help by filling out the surveys.

Jerry Zhu is a sophomore majoring in Economics. He serves as the community Opinion editor of The Daily Princetonian, and encourages you to submit a response to this piece or write an op-ed for the ‘Prince.’ You can reach him at jfz[at]princeton.edu.