Alumni Survey Results Released at Outreach Meeting, 19% Trust the Board of Trustees

The new Penn State alumni survey results are out, and they once again paint a positive picture for Penn State the institution as well as a continued reputational mess for its leadership.

The numbers, presented by representatives from survey firm Strategy One, were discussed at length at today’s Board of Trustees committee meeting on Outreach, Development, and Community Relations in Hershey.

The survey was taken in December 2014 before the NCAA sanctions were revoked.

As the annual surveys have shown since 2012, Penn State alumni love their university but distrust its leadership. Of the 1,304 alumni surveyed, 96 percent said they were satisfied with their Penn State experience, with 78 percent very satisfied.

Conversely, 19 percent said they trust the board of trustees and only 32 percent trust the administration. The trustee trust number is up from 16% last year, a point that the Strategy One representative stressed, but one that trustee Ted Brown vocally rejected.

“Plus 3 percent in a slow race? That’s a problem,” he said. “That’s saying that the thing I trust the least is us. I take no rejoicing in plus 3 percent on that number. On average it should be plus 40 percent.” The margin of error for the survey is 2.7 percent.

Faculty and staff was the most trusted group, with 64 percent, and students and alumni came in second with 62 percent each.

Alumni were also asked to rank what they think President Barron’s priorities should be.

The first category, at 20 percent, was restoring the reputation of Penn State. The second, at 13 percent, was affordability, with academic excellence just behind at 12 percent. This point devolved into a conversation, led by Brown, about how the trustees should be committed to ensuring no increase in tuition this year.

Committee chair Paul Silvis said that the conversation would be premature without an in-depth discussion and advisement from a budget officer, but Brown proposed a resolution stating that commitment anyway. The language was eventually softened to say that the trustees were committed to passing “the lowest tuition increase possible,” which passed unanimously. It is unclear what this had to do with the outreach committee.

Brown wasn’t done yet, however, lamenting the fact that the presenters skipped over the Joe Paterno statistic in the presentation. It was included in the Powerpoint, but not mentioned by the Strategy One people.

“One important statistic which was not presented was that 81 percent of respondents said that we should recognize Joe Paterno’s contribution,” Brown said.

You can check out the full survey results here.