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Create your survey

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How to create college graduate student survey about program satisfaction

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Adam Sabla

·

Aug 29, 2025

Create your survey

This article will guide you on how to create a College Graduate Student survey about Program Satisfaction. With Specific, you can build your survey in seconds—no research background required.

Steps to create a survey for College Graduate Students about program satisfaction

If you want to save time, just generate a survey with Specific. Seriously—it’s as easy as it sounds.

  1. Tell what survey you want.

  2. Done.

That’s it. You really don’t have to read further. The AI creates program satisfaction surveys with expert logic, so you always get relevant, actionable questions. And the best part: it asks your graduate students smart follow-up questions, ensuring you get rich, contextual insights beyond anything a static form could grab.

Why program satisfaction surveys matter for college graduate students

Let’s be honest: getting feedback from your College Graduate Students about their program experience is the easiest way to spot opportunities you’d otherwise miss. If you’re not running program satisfaction surveys, you’re missing out on:

  • Pinpointing which support systems work—and which leave grads frustrated

  • Understanding how financial support impacts student wellbeing

  • Identifying disconnects between program expectations and the real experience

  • Spotting what makes graduates proud to be part of your college or university

Check out this: at the University of Colorado Boulder, 68% of graduate students receiving funding were satisfied or very satisfied with the financial support from all sources. Yet, only about one-third felt their stipend truly covered the Boulder cost of living, highlighting the critical need to ask these questions and capture the full picture. [1]

Other universities back this up—at Vanderbilt, over 80% of third-year Ph.D. students say their program meets or exceeds expectations, but you only find that out by asking (and digging deeper with tailored surveys). [2] So, the importance of college graduate student recognition surveys goes even deeper: feedback is the launchpad for lasting improvements and community pride.

Don’t just hope you’re doing things right—run AI-driven graduate surveys and learn exactly where your program shines and where it falls short.

What makes a good survey on program satisfaction?

Simply putting together a handful of questions isn’t enough. To truly measure program satisfaction, you need:

  • Clear, unbiased questions that invite honest reflection—avoid jargon, make it easy to understand, and don’t push students toward a certain answer.

  • Conversational tone so College Graduate Students feel comfortable sharing critical and positive experiences.

  • Flexible structure—mixing open-ended and multiple-choice formats for both breadth and depth of insights.

When we look at survey results from South Dakota State University, 83.8% of grad students would choose SDSU again, and 88.4% said the quality of their experience met expectations. [3] Those numbers are useful only if students are prompted in a way that feels safe and authentic—not boxed-in or pressured.

Bad practices

Good practices

Vague, leading question: “You enjoyed the program, right?”

Neutral, direct: “How would you describe your satisfaction with the program?”

Only multiple-choice (no chance to elaborate)

Combining multiple-choice with follow-ups: “Why did you choose that answer?”

Formal, intimidating tone

Conversational: “Tell us in your own words what worked (or didn’t).”

The end game? High-quality and high-quantity responses. A good program satisfaction survey attracts lots of honest, detailed feedback from your College Graduate Students—not half-finished surveys and generic remarks.

Types of questions for a college graduate student survey about program satisfaction

Your survey toolkit is bigger than you think. There’s more than one right way to get meaningful feedback from College Graduate Students, and how you mix question types will directly impact the insights you get. Here’s how each type works best:

Open-ended questions let students elaborate freely—the goldmine for discovering why people feel the way they do. Use these when you want stories, context, or details about day-to-day realities. Two examples:

  • What has been the most positive aspect of your graduate program so far?

  • If you could change one thing about your graduate experience, what would it be?

Single-select multiple-choice questions help structure quantitative insights—great for fast analysis and comparison. Perfect for quick mood checks or choosing between standard options. For example:

How satisfied are you with the quality of academic advising you have received?

  • Very satisfied

  • Satisfied

  • Neutral

  • Dissatisfied

  • Very dissatisfied

NPS (Net Promoter Score) question is ideal for measuring loyalty—ie, “Would you recommend this program to others?” This question gives you a clear score at a glance. If you want to automate this, you can generate an NPS survey for college graduate students about program satisfaction. Example:

On a scale from 0–10, how likely are you to recommend your graduate program to others?

Followup questions to uncover "the why": If a response is vague, a smart follow-up brings clarity. Use follow-ups when you notice one-word replies or inconsistencies, or just want richer detail. Here’s what it can look like:

  • What factors most influenced your satisfaction level?

If you want more inspiration or ready-to-use examples, check out our guide on best survey questions for program satisfaction—packed with real-world tips on crafting perfect questions.

What is a conversational survey?

A conversational survey feels like a real chat with an expert—it’s adaptive, responsive, and flows naturally, not just a static form tossed at your students. Instead of one-time bursts of feedback that often miss the mark, a conversational survey (sometimes called an “AI survey”) reacts to each answer and digs deeper where it matters. Think of it as the difference between giving someone an interview versus handing them a worksheet.

Here’s a quick look:

Manual survey

AI-generated survey

Static, one-size-fits-all questions

Dynamic, tailored questions (with live follow-ups)

Time-consuming to build and adapt

Can generate any survey with one prompt

No conversation, hard to clarify answers

Clarifies and probes for context, just like a skilled interviewer

Boring forms—low engagement

Feels like a real chat—higher engagement and richer responses

Why use AI for College Graduate Student surveys? Simple: it’s faster, less stressful, and vastly more effective. You get richer data, effortlessly, with an experience that feels conversational for both sides. If you want to see how it works, check out this deep dive on how to create and analyze these AI survey examples.

With Specific, the user experience is best-in-class—especially in creating, editing, and running conversational surveys that simply work. Every insight is surfaced automatically, every conversation feels natural, and every College Graduate Student you reach will find the process engaging (not a chore).

The power of follow-up questions

Anyone who has analyzed program satisfaction surveys for College Graduate Students knows that most valuable insights come from those extra “why?” questions. And yet, manually following up—or coordinating by email—just isn’t scalable. That's why automated AI followups in Specific are a game changer.

  • Graduate student: “I liked most of my classes.”

  • AI follow-up: “Which classes stood out to you, and why? Was it the teaching style, the content, or something else?”

How many followups to ask? Usually, 2–3 targeted followup questions are all you need to get to the core of a response. You don’t have to go overboard—Specific lets you cap the number (and even skip to the next question if you’ve already got what you need).

This makes it a conversational survey: you ask, you probe, you clarify—just like an expert would in a real conversation—making every response richer and more actionable.

AI analysis, effortless insight: Even with lots of detailed, open-ended responses, it’s easy to analyze the results. Just leverage tools like Specific’s AI response analysis—no manual coding, no cut-and-paste jobs, just instant thematic breakdowns and summary charts.

Automated followup questions are still new for most survey creators. So go ahead—try generating your own College Graduate Student program satisfaction survey and see how much deeper your feedback sessions can go.

See this program satisfaction survey example now

Start collecting real insights from College Graduate Students with a conversational AI-powered survey, and turn feedback into program improvements—faster than ever.

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Sources

  1. University of Colorado Boulder. 2023 Graduate Student Survey Results

  2. Vanderbilt University News. Graduate Student Survey Indicates Satisfaction with Graduate Experience

  3. South Dakota State University. Graduate Student Survey Results

Adam Sabla - Image Avatar

Adam Sabla

Adam Sabla is an entrepreneur with experience building startups that serve over 1M customers, including Disney, Netflix, and BBC, with a strong passion for automation.

Adam Sabla

Adam Sabla is an entrepreneur with experience building startups that serve over 1M customers, including Disney, Netflix, and BBC, with a strong passion for automation.

Adam Sabla

Adam Sabla is an entrepreneur with experience building startups that serve over 1M customers, including Disney, Netflix, and BBC, with a strong passion for automation.