Survey: Undergraduates satisfied with UW-Madison experience

Eighty-eight percent of undergraduates at UW–Madison say they are satisfied (42 percent) or extremely satisfied (46 percent) with their overall university experience to date.

Those figures come from the fifth annual survey of student satisfaction at UW–Madison. The phone survey of a randomly selected sample of 1,216 undergraduates was conducted last fall by the UW Survey Center. In the fall 1997 semester, the university had a total undergraduate enrollment of 27,533.

The survey covers a broad range student experiences ranging from assessment of academics to feeling comfortable as a part of the UW–Madison community.

When asked if they would enroll at UW–Madison if they had it to do all over again, 91 percent of those surveyed said they would. That figure was 90 percent in 1996, 89 percent in 1995, 90 percent in 1994 and 89 percent in 1993.

There has been little change in overall levels of satisfaction over the past five years, says James Sweet, lead researcher on the project, Survey Center director and professor of sociology.

Other findings from the new survey:

• Ninety-three percent of the students rated UW–Madison as good, very good or excellent in terms of cost versus quality; in 1996 the figure was 91 percent.
• In overall quality of instruction, 66 percent of undergraduates say it is very good or excellent, compared to 63 percent in 1996.
• Out-of-classroom accessibility of faculty is ranked as good, very good or excellent by 87 percent of the students, compared to 86 percent from 1996.
• The quality of teaching by teaching assistants was ranked good, very good or excellent by 81 percent of the students.

As before, the 1997 survey asked students to rate various university services. Most of them continue to be ranked good through excellent by 85 percent or more of the respondents.

The 1997 report also features comparisons of satisfaction by year in school. Levels of overall satisfaction with the UW–Madison experience are very similar for freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors. Freshmen and sophomores are slightly less likely then juniors and seniors to be satisfied with class size, but there is no difference by year in school in assessment of the quality of instruction or in feelings of comfort as a part of the UW–Madison community.