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SCSU-tailored survey released
Every spring a random sample survey about SCSU campus issues, feelings, and concerns is fit and tailored to represent the SCSU student population.
The survey is taken by students that volunteer their time to gain experience. The group of students who are in charge of the survey brainstorm together to come up with a list of questions about issues or topics of interest that SCSU students might like some answers about.
This year the survey focused on the challenges that SCSU is facing, the quality of food and food services offered in Atwood Memorial Center, readership of University Chronicle, cigarette smoking and smoking policies on campus, dorm smoking policies, the treatment of off campus student renters, and computer lab availability around campus.
This year's survey was taken from March 25 - 28, from 4:30 to 9:30 p.m. On April 1, the survey was given to students who were hard to contact and to convert initially refused respondents to completed interviews. Volunteers made 1,200 phone calls to SCSU students who reside anywhere in Minnesota and had a telephone.
The final survey results consisted of a weighted sample of 530 respondents. Seven percent of the students surveyed were minorities, which is consistent with minority representation at SCSU.
Seventy-eight percent of students surveyed said that they feel SCSU is heading in the right direction, while 12 percent feel that SCSU is on the wrong track. Ten percent of the respondents chose to answer that they did not know if SCSU is heading in either direction. Angela Bennett, one of the senior student lab directors of the survey, said that freshmen tend to think that SCSU is heading in the right direction because there is a real sense of pride with first-year students. The survey results show that 90 percent of freshmen do think that SCSU is heading in the right direction.
Atwood food services was also a topic that the survey focused on. The quality, price and variety of food offered by Atwood were questions that students were asked to rate. The rates that students were given to choose from was excellent, pretty good, only fair and poor. Students were also given the choice to respond "don't know."
"Most people have an overall quality rating of the food," said Dave Lundy, who was a student lab supervisor of the survey.
Results showed that most students did typically choose to rate the food services of Atwood only fair, pretty good, and excellent.
University Chronicle and its readership was another series of questions that the survey team asked students to respond to. This part of the survey showed that students tend to read stories in University Chronicle that have a capturing headline. Male students were more likely to read every issue of University Chronicle, and 46 percent of the students on campus either read the newspaper every issue or frequently. Fifty-three percent of the students on campus rarely or never pick up the campus paper. Only 1 percent did not know how often they read University Chronicle.
For an overall rating, University Chronicle was given mostly a six or above on a scale of one to 10. The survey also indicated that 70 percent of students thought that University Chronicle has remained an impartial newspaper. Nineteen percent of students thought the paper is biased, and 11 percent did not know.
Issues surrounding smoking use, policies, and smoking bans were part of the survey for the third year in a row. Smoking is down on campus from 24 percent in 2001 to 22 percent in 2002. Ninety-four percent of the students surveyed believed that second hand smoke is somewhat harmful or very harmful. Seventy percent of students either agreed or strongly agreed that smoking should be banned from within 50 feet of an SCSU classroom, administrative, or activity building, not including dorms.
"Smoking statistics were the most surprising from the survey," Bennett said.
Eighty-four percent of students surveyed were in favor of the recently passed policy to temporarily ban smoking in residence halls until effective air filtration systems could be installed. Residents who took the survey were asked if they were bothered by smoking in the dorms and 50 percent said that they were not. Survey coordinators said that a designated dorm for smokers was favored by 67 percent of students.
Landlords' treatment of student tenants was another issue that the survey researched. Eighty-three percent of students who rent properties off campus from landlords said that they feel that they are treated the same or worse by the landlords because of their student status. Thirty-seven percent of SCSU students feel that the quality of the property in the St. Cloud area is worse than other areas. Most students said they did not feel that they had been discriminated against by landlords because of their gender or student status.
Sixty-two percent of students said that they liked having computer labs close to their classrooms. Only 29 percent of the students surveyed said that they preferred using a large centralized computer lab.
The survey team asked students to think of a thermometer from zero to 100 degrees as a way to rate how some organizations and individuals contribute to the quality of life at SCSU. President Roy Saigo was rated at 61, which means that overall students feel warmly about him. The SCSU men's hockey team was hot, getting a 74. The Greek system was a cool 48. Many other organizations rated well, including Atwood Memorial Center with a 75, University Chronicle getting a 69 and the University Program Board at 65.
Statistics and findings from the survey are available at the SCSU Survey Homepage at http://web.stcloudstate.edu/scsusurvey.
Geoff Higgins can be reached at: [email protected]
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