The class of 2007 was more satisfied with its campus experience than graduates in 2006 or in 2003, according to a survey of Sacramento State graduating seniors published last June by the Office of Institutional Research.

According to the survey, 79 percent of students were content with the overall education they received at Sac State.

Students were happier with the service they received in 17 different areas, such as job placement services, quality of programsof study and services for victims of crim

They also worked nearly twice as many hours per week than students polled four years ago.

Satisfaction dropped in only two areas: the variety of classes offered and veterans’ services.

“It’s been really hard to get classes,” said senior Renee Robertson. “It’s really frustrating…we need a variety of classes and enough seats for everyone enrolled.”

She said she enjoys a lot of services in the Union, such as the music listening center and Mellow Me Out.

Students said they were most contented with the library and learning resource center, which had an 82 percent satisfaction rate.

Jing Wang, director of the Office of Institutional Research, said it can be difficult for one office that serves a large percentage of the student population to make everyone happy.

“That really shows the quality of their work,” she said of the library’s high satisfaction rate.

A category on the survey called “veterans’ services” holds the lowest satisfactionrate on campus at 35 percent. That number is down nine percent from last year.

Wang said she is uncertain why the number is so low.

When the online questionnaire is e-mailed to graduating seniors in the spring, they have a chance to write personal comments about their experiences at Sac State. This can be a way to look outside the numbers for feedback about a specific department, Wang said.

She said her office didn’t see a lot of comments that specifically related to veterans’ services, so it is hard to know why the number dropped.

Jeff Weston, director of Veterans’ Affairs,said it’s possible for some of the low satisfaction results on the survey to come from veterans who have not necessarily been involved with or informed about the Veterans’ Affairs Office.

Weston said one of his office’s challenges is finding veterans on campus who didn’t label themselves as veterans on their applications, but may have labeled themselvesas veterans on the survey.

The VAO serves veterans and their dependentswho qualify to receive benefits for schooling, but has no direct role in helping veterans who no longer qualify for educational aid.

Weston is in the process of starting a student organization for veterans, which would let him reach out to those who may not be served by the VAO. Through the student organization, he hopes to spread the word about presentations on relevant issues and veterans’ programs in the Sacramento region.

The VAO is also in the process of designingits own internal satisfaction survey, which would be given to nearly 650 veterans later this semester.

Those results would be more relevant to the VAO than the results of the GraduatingSeniors Survey, Weston said. He hopes to find out what goals and services Veterans’ Affairs should focus on for the future, and create an assessment plan based on those goals.

Wang said the Graduating Seniors Survey is used so “we can get feedback to evaluate our work.”

The complaints also give Sac State clear goals to improve upon, Wang said. For example, if students complain about a lack of staff in one area, that department may try to get more funding to hire additionalworkers.

Though the survey used to be given only every three years, it will now be given everyyear in the spring. It is not sent to fall graduates.

“That’s stupid that they don’t poll both sets (of graduates),” said junior A.J. Johnson, who double-majors in business marketing and Spanish. “If you don’t poll everyone, that’s like cutting the number of complaints in half.”

Last April, 45 percent of the graduating senior class responded to the survey. This is four times the number of students who responded last year.

Wang said that’s partly because this year, the survey was taken online instead of via mail-in cards. New incentives were offered too, such as gift cards and iPods. People who took the survey were entered into a lottery drawing for the prizes.

The Graduating Seniors Survey results are published online. Hard copies of the numbers, along with the personal comments, are delivered to the school’s highest-ranking officials.

Faculty members are not given a hard copy of the report. An announcement is sent to them with a link to the survey results, which is posted on the school’s website.

Although the survey is supposed to be used to measure performance improvements, there is no way to ensure that everyone reads it, Wang said.

Survey results can be found at http://www.oir.csus.edu/Reports/Graduating_Survey/Grad_Student_Report_07Final.pdf

Lacey Waymire can be reached at [email protected].