The University of Pittsburgh offers students a wide variety of educational opportunities both inside and outside the classroom to become engaged with new ideas, people, and experiences. The University of Pittsburgh measures the effectiveness of these opportunities by utilizing a variety of survey methods to better understand what types of activities and programs students find the most helpful. The University of Pittsburgh annually participates in The Student Experience in The Research University (SERU) survey. Information about this survey is available at: http://www.cshe.berkeley.edu/SERU. Given the manner in which these SERU survey data are collected, that is, they are based on student responses - with each question's response based only on those students who chose to respond to that particular survey question - these SERU results may differ from other official University-published data.
Institutions participating in the VSA program measure student involvement on campus using one of four national surveys. Results from the one survey are reported for a common set of questions selected as part of VSA. Following are the selected results from the University of California Undergraduate Experience Survey (UCUES). The questions have been grouped together in categories that are known to contribute to student learning and development. The results reported below are based on the responses of seniors who participated in the survey.