About 6,800 students have taken UF's Student Experience at Research Universities (SERU) online survey, which almost all undergraduates have to take in order to be eligible for the football ticket lottery.
UF hopes to use the survey to improve student programs and academic offerings, said Marie Zeglen, UF's assistant provost and director of Institutional Planning and Research.
Though the survey is being conducted while UF is examining ways to meet a possible $72 million to $75 million budget cut, it will not be used to determine which programs should stay or go next year, Zeglen said.
The University of California at Berkeley was contracted at a price of $18,000 to create the survey, she said. That money doesn't count the time UF staff have put into implementing it and will spend studying the results this summer.
There has been some confusion recently as to whether the survey is mandatory, including an e-mail sent to the French department listserv by an adviser stating the survey is "compulsory for all U.F. majors."
Even though it's not mandatory, some students are not too thrilled with the survey.
"It was very repetitive and really annoying," said UF elementary education junior Katy Gibson.
"I don't think you should have to take it to get football tickets," she added.
Students who are under 18 years old, non-degree seeking or only enrolled in correspondence courses are not required to take the survey.
