The Science of Surveys

Alumni surveys are used to evaluate attitudes, obtain career outcome data, update alumni profiles and assess alumni interests in programs and events. Surveys are used to obtain feedback on what schools are doing well and where improvements can be made. Alumni surveys provide schools with much actionable information that can be used to engage alumni and increase giving.

It is important that alumni surveys are well designed and have a clear purpose. They should be brief, use properly worded questions and appropriate item formats. Alumni surveys need to obtain the information a school needs. A well-designed survey will have a higher response rate, more likely obtain the information alumni advancement professionals need and have a much more positive effect on alumni attitudes.

When HSR conducts an alumni survey, we frequently merge our survey data with any relevant archival records that schools maintain on individual alumni. Assuming your archival records already include data on alumni gender, class year, academic programs or the student organizations and clubs to which alumni belonged, we do not have to include these questions on our survey. This keeps our surveys brief, and makes it much more likely that alumni will participate. However, if you do not have this information, we can ask these questions, and you can upload these data into your alumni records. We can help you mine existing archival records, or if these data bases are missing important records, we can help you build these alumni profiles. We typically discuss these issues in the survey design phase.

For an alumni survey to be truly successful, it needs to have the full support of the school’s academic leaders and campus community. Key stakeholders should be involved throughout the survey process. Alumni survey results need to be shared with the alumni and campus communities, and drive the school’s alumni engagement strategies. It is important that schools be able to show alumni that they have put their feedback to work.

Our consultants are experts at survey research, have considerable experience working with colleges, universities and alumni organizations, and are skilled organizational consultants. We will help you use their survey results to build more engaged alumni communities and increase alumni giving.

Contact us at 410.893.5152 or info@harfordsurveyresearch.com to find out more about our survey services.