What is the "Davis Survey" that my college is trying to get me to
take? They say that they will give me extra points ony my exam if I
answer their questions. It sounds suspicious, though, they ask
personal questions about my recreational and religious activities.

I go to UMASS.

Hello and thank you for your question.

The Student Life Survey is a product of the Student Affairs Research
and Information (SARI) program at UC Davis
http://www.sariweb.ucdavis.edu/

SARI is heavily into polling the student body at UC Davis, as
evidenced by its web page promotion of its "core activities."
http://www.sariweb.ucdavis.edu/onepageofficesummary.pdf

Some of the SARI projects are described in greater detail at
http://www.sariweb.ucdavis.edu/Goals/Goals0004.htm

The program has been influential in the academic world
http://www.uncc.edu/stuaffairs/sar/projects.htm
and UMass like many other schools now has its own SARI program and staff
http://www.umass.edu/sareo/
"Each year, SAREO conducts in-depth studies of student attitudes and
behavior. Information is generally collected through telephone surveys
of random samples of University of Massachusetts students (although
other forms of data collection have been used). One example is the
Cycles Survey, a study repeated annually since 1975 which examines
levels of satisfaction with student services and the general quality
of life on campus. Another example is the ACE/CIRP Freshman Survey on
the expectations of first-year students prior to entering the
University, conducted under the auspices of the American Council on
Education's Cooperative Institutional Research Program. This survey
has been administered to all first-year students for the past
twenty-five years.
SAREO also provides a wide range of program evaluation services to the
offices within Student Affairs. Because these efforts are based on the
individual client's needs, they are quite diverse: assisting in the
identification of evaluation goals and needs, proposing a research
plan, drawing samples for data collection, designing survey
instruments, conducting data analysis, and interpreting and reporting
existing data."
http://www.umass.edu/sareo/RE_home.html

For further information about what's driving the program, you could contact
Gary D. Malaney
Director, Student Assessment, Research, and Evaluation Office
Coordinator, Higher Education Program
University of Massachusetts Amherst
malaney@educ.umass.edu


I hope you find this information useful (and not too threatening)

Search terms used:
"davis survey" student
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saris site:umass.edu

Google Answers Researcher
Richard-ga

This has sufficiently answered my question.