Undergraduate Survey Tracks Student Habits, Backgrounds

From study habits to attitudes about diversity, the result of an undergraduate survey administered by the University of California give a peek into the lives and backgrounds of students enrolled in the system.

The results of the survey, which ended earlier this month, were presented to the UC Board of Regents last week and track the backgrounds and attitudes of the more than 58,000 students who participated.

The survey, which collected information relating to undergraduates’ backgrounds, academic experiences, motivations and how they spend their time, was intended to give administrators a sense of the pulse of student life in the university system, said Steve Chatman, the project director for the UC Undergraduate Experience Survey.

“We’re trying to promote scholarly research about undergraduate education as well as reach our goals for the administrative aspects of the information, which is used in academic program reviews, major reviews and evaluating services to students,” he said.

One section of the survey was aimed specifically at determining undergraduate attitudes about diversity and tolerance in the UC system.

Between 79 and 90 percent of students who took the survey reported that they believed students are respected regardless of gender, sexual orientation, religion, political beliefs, race and ethnicity, or economic and social class.

According to the survey, 23 percent of undergraduates who responded were born outside the United States while 37 percent have at least one parent who was born outside the United States. In addition, 35 percent of undergraduates who took the survey are not native English speakers.

Beyond probing students on diversity and their backgrounds, the questionnaire also asked about study habits, with 42 percent of respondents saying that being easily distracted and unable to concentrate was the most common impediment to their academic success.

The survey also found that students spend an average of 11.1 hours per week surfing the Web, 5.7 hours a week watching television, and 13.1 hours on schoolwork outside of the classroom.

Despite 55 percent of students agreeing that the university’s emphasis on research detracts from the quality of instruction, the survey reported a high level of overall satisfaction with the UC system.

Eighty-seven percent of students reported that they were at least somewhat satisfied with the quality of instruction, while 82 percent felt that they belong at their campus and 82 percent also reported that they felt that knowing what they know now, they would still enroll at the campus they chose.

The Undergraduate Experience Survey has been administered since 2002 as a collaborative research project of UC faculty and campus research professionals.

Although Chatman said none of the results were entirely unexpected, he said the survey is an important tool used to dispel misconceptions about undergraduate life.

“It is a remarkable resource and unique in the country. We have over seven hundred pieces of information that come in, and it shows us that a lot of things we assume to be true really aren’t,” he said.

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