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CU-BOULDER CAMPUS CLIMATE SURVEY: FALL 2001

METHODS

In fall 2001 we conducted a survey of the CU-Boulder campus climate. We asked a random sample of undergraduate and graduate students to tell us about:

• their level of comfort on the Boulder campus and in the community
• the extent to which they feel they fit in and are welcome at UCB
• their experiences with stereotyping based on an important group identification
• how often they hear negative remarks or see negative behaviors targeted at members based on group membership.

Web-based questionnaires were completed by 641 students, or 49% of those surveyed. This report summarizes the results.

Population and sample

The population included all undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in fall 2001 who had an email address and who had not requested that their personal directory information be kept private. A stratified random sample of 998 undergraduates and 300 graduate students was contacted. Students of color, foreign students, gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender (GLBT),and students with disabilities were oversampled to allow us to report responses for these groups separately.

Contact method

RESPONSE RATES

Forty-nine percent of sample members completed the questionnaire on the Web (n=641). This rate is in the range of recent web surveys conducted by our office on various topics. However, it is slightly below the 54% we obtained on a community survey administered in fall 1998. The community survey was similar in content to the climate survey except that it focused almost exclusively on racial/ethnic issues. It was administered on paper only to undergraduates and included a $2 bill incentive and phone follow-up to nonrespondents.

Response rate is related to ethnic group, with African Americans having the lowest response rate at 40% and Native Americans having the highest at 56%.

Response rates for various demographic groups

QUESTIONNAIRE DESIGN

The 2001 campus climate survey was modeled after the 1998 campus community survey. Items assessing comfort, fit, experiences with stereotyping, and the extent to which different campus/community groups value diversity, were similar across the two surveys, with the exception that the community survey focused exclusively on race/ethnicity.

New items added to the climate survey assess:

• amount of interaction with members of various groups (e.g., women, men, ethnic/racial minorities, etc.)
• frequency with which disparaging remarks are heard or negative graffiti is seen on campus
• general characteristics of the classroom or outside the classroom experiences as relates to sexism, racism, etc.
• how likely students are to challenge others on remarks or behavior targeted at individuals based on group membership

The questionnaire also contains three open-ended items designed to provide more detailed information on times students have felt uncomfortable on campus or, more positively, experiences on campus that develop understanding between people of different backgrounds.

RESPONDENTS VS. NONRESPONDENTS

In comparing respondents to nonrespondents, females, graduate students, and students in the College of Engineering were more likely to respond than males, undergraduates, and students in other colleges, respectively. In addition, African American students were significantly less likely to respond than were students in other racial/ethnic groups.

As has been the case with other surveys, students with higher cumulative GPAs (end of fall term) are more likely to respond to the survey than are students with lower GPAs (mean = 3.1 for respondents versus 2.8 for nonrespondents). However, among respondents, GPA is virtually unrelated to most questionnaire responses. Students with higher GPAs do report more comfort interacting with faculty and, as would be expected, that faculty are less likely to stereotype them as low academic performers based on some other group characteristic (e.g., race, gender, etc.). However, even these relationships are small (correlations less than .20) and no other items show a significant relationship to GPA.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The student climate survey was developed and administered by PBA on behalf of Ofelia Miramontes, Associate Vice Chancellor Diversity and Equity. We wish to acknowledge the contributions of Ofelia, MaryAnn Sergeant (also of Diversity and Equity), and Beverly Tuel, former director of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Resource Center, in assisting with the development of the climate questionnaire. We also wish to thank Elease Robbins, Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs and Dean of Students, for reviewing and commenting on the final draft of the questionnaire. Finally, we would like to thank CU-Boulder student Rachel Lease for her assistance in recruiting GLBT survey participants from CU-Boulder classes and committees and CU-Boulder psychology graduate student Sei Jin Ko for assisting with data analysis and report preparation.

Campus Climate Survey 2001 Table of Contents

l:\ir\survey\climate\climate01\report\methods.doc last updated 7/9/02

Last revision 08/09/02