SUNY’s Student Satisfaction Survey Replaces Student Opinion Survey

The SUNY Student Satisfaction Survey (SSS) is a new survey that replaces the SUNY Student Opinion Survey (SOS). The SOS was developed and administered by ACT (American College Testing) for the SUNY System to assess undergraduate students’ perception of their satisfaction with their college experience. First administered in 2021, the SSS is a SUNY in-house survey that was created collaboratively by several SUNY campuses and SUNY Central Administration. The redesigned survey is shorter than the SOS and seeks feedback from undergraduate students on various topics related to their satisfaction with campus climate, their educational experiences, programs, facilities, and services. In addition, the survey collects feedback from students on their satisfaction with the campus’ response to current events. Similar to the SOS, the SSS will be implemented on a three-year cycle.

Like many survey instruments, the SSS uses identical Likert scale questions allowing campuses to gather trend data for some of the areas assessed. The Office of Institutional Research will administer the survey when our campus participates, and SUNY will analyze the results. For the inaugural administration of the SSS in fall 2021, the SUNY Institutional Research office provided comparative data for participating campuses which gave campuses the ability to compare their rank with other SUNY participating institutions, peers, and other institutions.

Use of the Student Satisfaction Survey Data

Not unlike the SOS, information from the SSS will inform us of where we are succeeding and/or exceeding expectations and areas that need attention. Thus, we will use information from the survey to improve our university and the quality of our programs and services.