College Senior Survey

The College Senior Survey (CSS) connects academic, civic, and diversity outcomes with a comprehensive set of college experiences to measure the impact of college. Although the CSS can be used as a stand-alone instrument, when used in conjunction with the CIRP Freshman Survey (TFS), the Diverse Learning Environments Survey (DLE), or the Your First College Year Survey (YFCY), the CSS generates valuable longitudinal data on students’ cognitive and affective growth during college.

Registration for the 2025 CSS is open now. The 2025 CSS may be administered from December 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025.

About the College Senior Survey

The College Senior Survey is designed as an exit survey for graduating seniors. The CSS focuses on a broad range of college outcomes and post-college goals and plans including:

academic achievement and engagement
student-faculty interaction
cognitive and affective development
student goals and values
satisfaction with the college experience
degree aspirations and career plans
post-college plans

Schools participating in the CSS receive an institutional profile, which includes institutional results broken out by gender identity, graduation status, comparisons with other similar institutions, significance testing, and effect sizes; CIRP Construct report; executive summary PowerPoint slide deck; and a data file of student responses.

Schools using the CSS as a post-test to the TFS will also receive a Longitudinal Profile, which can be used to assess growth and change over time.

Administering the CSS

The CSS Survey is a web survey that can be administered either with your campus managing the email notification process, or for ease of use, you can elect to have HERI manage the email notifications to students. Our web portal allows you to set email notification and reminder dates, customize “welcome” and “thank you” pages, customize email notifications, and upload your additional questions. Throughout the administration, you can monitor your response rates in real time. Your survey data updates in real time, so you can download your preliminary data file at any point to analyze early responses.

The Survey Instrument

Important Forms and Documentation

2025 CSS

Administration Guidelines – Necessary information for schools concerning the administration of the College Senior Survey
Administration Timeline – Use the timeline to track the general tasks required during a survey cycle
Survey Information Sheet – Copy of the informed consent given to survey respondents
Student Identifiers – Find out how student identifiers can help you merge data for longitudinal analyses
Additional Questions – Important information for campuses adding their own questions to the instrument
School Managed Distribution – Instructions for sending your email invitations directly from your institution
Invitation and Reminder Templates – Sample text for inviting your students to participate
Welcome and Thank You text – Editable text for your welcome and thank you survey pages
Mailing List – Sample file for uploading student names/email addresses
Anti-Spam Guidelines – How to prevent survey invitation and reminders from CIRP being filtered out as bulk or junk email
Group Codes – Comparing specific subgroups of your student sample
Confidentiality and Privacy – Protocol for ensuring the confidentiality and privacy of our data and suggestions about how you assure your students that their information is safe
Encouraging Participation – Suggestions for increasing response rates
Promo Pack – Instructions on how to use Promo Packs
Pre-notification Email Templates – Editable text for your pre-notification emails
Data and Reporting – Description of the institutional data and reporting institutions will receive from CIRP
UCLA IRB Approval Notice – Copy of the current UCLA IRB approval for the CSS

Survey Fees

The combined survey administration and registration fee is calculated based on total full-time equivalent (FTE) undergraduate enrollment (for student surveys) or full-time faculty (faculty/staff survey) with information obtained from the IPEDS database on September 1, 2021. Click here to determine the cost for your institution: https://heri.ucla.edu/pricing/

Optional Costs
-Customized Welcome and Thank You Pages: no additional fee
-Additional questions – 30 closed-ended and/or 5 open-ended: $400
-Group Codes: no additional fee
-HERI-managed email distribution to students: $400
-School-managed email distribution: no additional fee

Billing Policy
HERI uses a two-step process for billing. First, within two weeks of receiving an order to administer one of our surveys from an authorized campus representative, we will send an invoice to that representative or the designated billing contact requesting payment for a $1,000 registration deposit. This registration deposit will be credited toward the total administration cost. Should needs on campus change, please read below to review our cancellation policy.

Second, approximately six weeks before the national administration closes for the College Senior Survey, we will send a second invoice for the remaining balance associated with the survey administration, including any optional services requested during the administration period (i.e., HERI-managed emails, additional questions).

The costs for administering HERI’s surveys cover customer service support from HERI’s staff throughout the administration process, the full suite of campus reports (i.e., Institutional Profile Report, Construct Report, Theme Report, Executive Summary PowerPoint), preparation of the final dataset, and targeted consultation to help clarify or explain the results featured in each set of reports.

We will continue to invoice separately for any orders for data services or customized reports placed by authorized campus representatives, and we typically send those invoices within two weeks of fulfilling each order. Additionally, for campuses that have more specific needs related to developing more tailored surveys, generating a more comprehensive, in-depth analysis of their survey data, or creating a more comprehensive assessment of campus climate, HERI staff members are available for more extensive consulting partnerships. Please contact us at heri@ucla.edu for more information.

*Expedited payment is helpful because UCLA charges additional fees after invoices become 90 days past due. If there are delinquency fees on your account, your payment will be applied to these charges first. The unpaid balance on the account will remain past due and will continue to accrue additional delinquency fees. Balances which remain unpaid for several months risk going to collections.

Cancellation Policy
Placing an order indicates your institution’s agreement to participate in the survey. HERI will refund $800 of the $1,000 deposit if a campus informs HERI in writing of its decision to cancel the administration for the College Senior Survey more than two weeks before the launch of the survey. HERI will refund $200 of the $1,000 deposit for orders canceled one week before the launch of the survey. If the survey is within one week of the launch date and your institution has received survey links or distributed links via HERI’s email system, you will be charged the full $1,000 (or forfeit the $1,000 if already paid) with no refund/credit.

Withdrawal Policy

If the URL(s) have already been sent to the institution or distributed via HERI’s email distribution service to the sample of intended survey participants, the campus will forfeit the full $1,000 registration deposit. In addition, if HERI has provided any customized services at your request (e.g., incorporated on-line additional questions, etc.), you will also be responsible for the full cost of these services.

Registration for the 2025 CSS is open now. The 2025 CSS may be administered from December 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025.