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UCSC Graduate Student Survey

Thank you to all graduate students who participated in the 2023 Graduate Student Survey!

 

                                 

 

The UCSC Graduate Student Survey provides graduate students with a unique formal opportunity to share your experiences and input about your graduate program, mentoring, financial support, the climate for diversity, your experiences as a TA, GSR, or GSI, and your satisfaction with campus services. 

Results are incorporated into regular formal reviews of each graduate program, and findings from the survey are shared with faculty, staff, and campus decisionmakers. The survey has been run since 2007. 

What Were Some Key Findings from the 2021 Survey?

Student Experiences in the Program (teaching quality Arts 81%, PBSci 86%, Social Sciences 87%, Engineering 70%, Humanities 92%)

Top Features of Future Jobs (work-life balance 83%, Intellectual challenge 81%, job security 80%, benefits 77%)
 
Career Advice from Primary Advisor (Students reported hearing more information from their advisors about jobs within academia than outside academia)
 
Housing Insecurity (Some students in all divisions moved in the last 12 months because of financial reasons, especially in the Humanities)
These findings are based on responses from doctoral students in all divisions.

Want to Learn More?

See the Graduate Student Survey Results page for many reports with survey findings, infographics, and interactive data tables, including for master's and doctoral students, results by academic division, and special reports on topics of campus-wide interest.

How Results Are Used to Improve the Graduate Student Experience

1. Detailed reports of results for academic departments
  • Survey findings are incorporated into regular formal reviews of academic departments, to improve academic training, curriculum, mentoring, and professional development opportunities.

2. Reports for academic divisions

  • These reports inform how departments throughout each division are doing overall.

3. Topic-specific reports on matters of campus-wide importance

  • Recent reports have highlighted students' financial support and situation, needs in teaching preparation, and satisfaction with campus services, and are shared with student services units throughout campus.

4. Spotlighting suggestions from open-ended questions

  • The 2023 survey contains many opportunities to provide comments and suggestions on program curriculum and mentoring, support for graduate students in writing, work as a TA, GSR, or GSI, campus services, and other areas. Deidentified comments are incorporated into reports for each graduate program to communicate suggestions to department faculty and division leaders.  Suggestions are also used to improve student services.

Prize Drawings

Participating graduate students will be entered into prize drawings, held during the survey and at the close of the survey.

Privacy

Responses are maintained securely and confidentially.  The Institutional Research, Assessment, and Policy Studies office at UC Santa Cruz does not share individual-level survey data with anyone.  Please see the campus surveys privacy and confidentiality page for additional information.

For More Information

If you have questions, please write to surveys@ucsc.edu.

The 2023 Graduate Student Survey is sponsored by the UC Santa Cruz Division of Graduate Studies and by Institutional Research, Assessment, and Policy Studies.  The survey is open in Spring 2023, and will close during Summer session.  Since 2021, the UC Santa Cruz survey has been part of a systemwide survey titled the University of California Graduate Student Experience Survey (UCGSES).

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The mission of Graduate Studies is to attract, recruit and retain an outstanding cohort of diverse graduate students, while providing the highest quality educational experience possible as we support them towards their graduation and prepare them for successful careers.

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Institutional Research, Assessment, and Policy Studies (IRAPS) is the primary office for the administration and analysis of campus-wide student surveys.