A new survey evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of the
Greek system is being introduced at UCLA this quarter.
The survey, which was created by Educational Benchmarking, Inc.,
is being administered by the Center for Student Programming as a
way to investigate whether the Greek system is meeting its
members’ needs.
“Basically it’s a way for the university to see what
they’re doing for the Greek community and help out more, to
see what’s working well,” said Chris Hatfield,
president of UCLA’s Interfraternity Council.
The survey covers a variety of aspects concerning Greek life,
including the members’ academic success and their abilities
to make lasting friendships and to drink responsibly. The questions
are grouped into what Educational Benchmarking, Inc. calls
“factors,” which then allow for more in-depth analysis
of the results.
“Unlike some other surveys, we not only tell each of the
universities by chapter how people felt about each of the areas,
we’re also able to identify … what it is that’s
really important,” said Joe Pica, the company’s
CEO.
To pay for the survey, the Center for Student Programming
received about $3,000 from the division of Student and Campus Life.
Anonymous surveys are being distributed to fraternity and sorority
members during their Monday night meetings throughout this quarter,
with chapter presidents returning the completed surveys to the
center.
They will then be sent to the company for analysis, and the
results will come back to the center and individual chapters by
August or September.
Pica said the company uses a statistical formula called a
regression to tell universities which factors will have the
greatest impact on their overall performance.
But as a stipulation of the program, those results can only be
used within the program, not released publicly or used as a way to
compare one school’s Greek system to another’s.
Pica said Educational Benchmarking, Inc. uses this rule because
people tend to answer questions more positively if the results are
being used as a ranking, skewing the results and making it harder
for schools to improve.
“That compromises the ability of the folks that are trying
to make it better because they’re not getting accurate
information,” Pica said. “The only way you can improve
is if people are willing to give you honest feedback about the
positives and negatives of the experience.”
The Greek system survey is a relatively new part of what the
company offers. Greek adviser Scott Carter said UCLA has not used
this particular survey before because it has only been available to
universities for two years.
UCLA has used some of the company’s other surveys in the
past, including one examining the effectiveness of the residential
assistant program.
Jack Gibbons, associate director of the Office of Residential
Life, said ORL used the survey once or twice because it allowed
them to compare UCLA’s results with those of other
institutions, but has since stopped employing the company’s
services.
“The reason we have not continued using the EBI survey is
because the value of the comparative data of this general survey
does not outweigh the value of having surveys that are specific to
our own organization,” Gibbons said.